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CLAIMS OF OFFICERS 




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A FULL AND FAITHFUL ACCOUNT 



i 
ORIGIN AND PROSECUTION OF THOSE UNPAID CLAIMS OP REVO- fi 
LUTIONARY OFFICERS WHICH AROSE OUT OF THE ACTS OF 
CONGRESS OF OCTOBER 21, '^^ AND MARCH 22, ^^5=: y/^fj 
SHOWING THEIR MERIT AND EXISTING OBLI- ^ -^ 
GATION UPON THE COUNTRY ; IN AN- 
SWER TO ALL OBJECTIONS. 



" Here was a delJt acknowledged to have been once due and which was never discharged 
because the payment was forced and defective. * * Tlie in.1usticc which has taken place 
has been enormous and flagrant, and makes redress a great national object." 

JAMES MADISON, ^ , 
1 February l®ft, 1790. 

" These express and solemn promises (of October 17S0 and March 1783) thus made to the 
defenders of the country, in the hour of their .suffering and of ovir peril, have never been 
performed. Disguise it, cover it. evade it'as we will, the truth still is that this plighted 
faith has never been redeemed. » * Never was public faith pledged more solemnly, or 

for better cause." ^„^ „ 

DANIEL WEBSTER, 

January 12th, 1827. 

" I say thif is not a gratuity. There was a moral obligation, a higli obligation to satisfy 
this debt of the revolution. It was out of that we derived our very being as an independ- 
ent and sovereign Governivient." 

.TNO .T. CRITTENDEN, 

December 2.3d, 18.56. 



WASHINGTON : 
H p. POLK-INHORN. PRINTER. 

1877. 



REYOLUTIOMRT OFFICERS' CLAIMS. 



The Bill, (H. B.) ITo, 3694, now before Congress, to provide for 
these claims, is entitled, " A Bill to provide for the settlement of 
the unpaid claims of those officers of the line of the Revolution- 
ary Army v^dio served to the close of the War of Independence, 
and so returned on the books of the Treasury." 

This measure comes down to us from the opening of the Repub- 
lic, connecting the glories, but also the responsibilities, of her ear- 
liest and her present day. 

The only explanation that can be given for the obtrusion of such 
a Bill within the precincts of our second century is to be found in 
the fact that the debt it contemplates was considerable, and due at 
home to those whose potency ceased with their disbandment, and 
whose rights, therefore, it has been deemed safe to disappoint and 
disregard, and, by a few, to deny. 

Towards a case of this sacred sort — and who can conceive one 
more so — it plainly devolves on a great and mighty people to place 
itself in an attitude of unmixed and entire good faith, free from all 
artifice and finesse of thought and word, and to determine the result 
according to actual facts and genuine testimony. Pervaded by this 
vievi\ a thorough investigation of the whole subject is herein 
faithfully presented; and the subject is divided, for convenience 
sake, into the several parts or heads, under which it seems natu- 
rally to fall. 

Respecting Half-pay and Commutation. 

On these subjects there is nothing higher or more authoritative 
than the declarations of Congress. 

On the 11th July, 1783, the Legislature of the State of Massachu- 
setts addressed a letter to Congress complaining of the half pay ar- 
rangement with the officers of the army, and the " proposed" com- 
mutation for the half pay, together " with some other matters of a 
similar nature." These measures were reported to have produced 
" among the people of that Commonwealth the greatest concern and 
uneasiness, and to have involved its legislature in no small embar- 
rassments." The principal objects of popular displeasure in Massa- 
chusetts were the " half pay " and the " commutation " which had 
superseded it, whilst the only "other matter of a similar nature" 
specially mentioned, but which was declared " inconsistent " with 
republican "equality, the state of our finances, the rules of equity. 



and a proper regard for the public good," was the " extraordinary " 
salaries alleged to be paid to the " civil officers appointed by Con- 
gress." Tliese three, or rather two, " matters " (for " half pay " had 
subsided into "commutation " several months before the letter was 
written) were said to have pressed so heavily on the popular mind 
in the State as to be "threatening" nothing less than a "dissolu- 
tion of the Union," though the " ruin which would inevitably ensue 
thereon " was freely enough admitted. 

This message, from a State so important and influential as Mas- 
sachusetts, and conveying so much of censure and even menace, 
put Congress into a very sober and serious frame of mind. The 
letter was the subject of consideration for several successive days, 
beginning with the 16th of September following. On the 25th of 
September Congress came to a determination about what it should 
say in reply, and adopted the following Report as its answer, viz : 

" That the subjects of complaint in the said letter (from Massa- 
"chusetts) are the grant of half-pay for life to the officers of the 
" Army ; the commutation granted to the said officers of five years' 
" whole pay in lieu of the said half-pay ; and the salaries allowed to 
" the civil officers of Congress. 

" That without dwelling on the reasonableness and justice of a 
" provision in favor of those whose former professions, pursuits and 
" prospects have, in a long course of military service, given place 
" to habits and acquirements, which, on the return of peace, how- 
" ever honorable they may be to the possessor, cease to be a source 
" of profit to him. Your committee observe, that the half-pay was 
" granted at a critical period of the war, when our finances were 
" embarrassed, our credit impaired, our army distracted, the officers 
" discontented, and resignations so general as to threaten the dissolu- 
" tion of a corps on whose military experience the public safety, in 
" the judgment of the Commander-in-Chief, greatly depended. The 
" first grant was limited to seven years, but not being deemed satis- 
" factory by the army, the evil of resignations continued to prevail 
"to so alarming a degree, as to require a more efl'ectual remedy 
*' and the grant of half-pay to the officers was extended for life. 

" Your committee are persuaded that no doubt can be entertained, 
" but that Congress were of opinion that this provision was alone 
" competent, if it was not the only one at that time in their power, 
" to establish a military force capable of opposing the dangers with 
" which the United States were then surrounded. That although it 
"is to be regretted that any measure has been adopted by Congress, 
" which has given uneasiness to the legislature or the citizens of 
" Massachusetts ; yet experience has shown how essentially that 
" provision in question has contributed to the stability of the army, 
" to its perfection in discipline, to the vigor and decision of its op- 
" erations, and to those brilliant successes which have hastened the 
" blessings of a safe and honorable peace. 

" Your Committee hold it to be the bounden duty of Congress, to 



" leave no effort unessaved that may enable them to conform to the 
*' known and express sense of their constituents ; but a perfect com- 
" pliance with the wishes of every part, will often be found, after 
"due consideration, impracticable. 

" Your Committee consider the measure of Congress as the result 
" of a deliberate judgment, framed on a general view of the interests 
"of the Union at large. They conclude it to be a truth, that no 
" State in this Confederacy can claim (more equitable than an indi- 
" vidual in a society) to derive advantages from a Union, without 
" conforming to the judgment of a constitutional majoritj' of those 
" who compose it ; still, however, they conceive it will be found no 
" less true, that if^ State every way so important as Massachusetts, 
" should withhold her solid support to constitutional measures of 
" the Contedearcy, the result must be a dissolution of the Union ; 
"and then she must hold herself as alone responsible for the anar- 
" chy and domestic confusion that may succeed, and for exposing all 
" these confederated States (who at the commencement of the late 
" war leagued to defend her violated rights) an easy prey to the 
" machinations of their enemies, and the sport of European politics. 
" And therefore they are of opinion, that Congress should still con- 
" fide, that a free, enlightened, and generous people will never haz- 
" ard consequences so perilous and alarming; and in all circum- 
" stances rely on the wisdon:, temper and virtue of their constituents, 
" which (guided by an Allwise Providence), have ever interposed 
"to avert impending evils and misfortunes. 

" Your Committee beg leave further to observe that, from an 
" earnest desire to give satisfaction to such of the States as expressed a 
" dislike to the half pay establishment, a sum in gross was proposed 
" by Congress and accepted by the Officers, as an equivalent for their 
" half pay. That your Committee are informed that such equiva- 
" lent w^as ascertained on established principles which are acknowl- 
" edged to be just, and adopted in similar cases; but that if the ob- 
" jection against the commutation were ever so valid, yet, as it is not 
" now under the arbitration of Congress, but an act finally adopted, 
" and the national faith pledged to carry it into effect, they could not be 
" taken into consideration. 

" With regard to the salaries of civil officers it may be observed, 
" that the necessaries of life have been very high during the War : 
" hence it has happened that even the salaries complained of have 
" not been found sufficient to induce persons, properly qualified, to 
" accept of many important offices, and the public business is left 
" undone. 

" Your Committee are nevertheless of Opinion that since the ces- 
" sation of hostilities, the expense of living is moderated, and that 
" a considerable reduction may be made in the civil list." 

The most pointed among the several replies in this comprehensive 
answer is found in the last paragraph but two, where Congress di- 
rectly challenges the repeated but really unveracious and unjustifi- 



able use in the letter of the word " proposed," as qnalifying " com- 
mutation." Not " proposed " merely ; not now under " considera- 
tion ;" but '* an act (they say) finaW/ adopted, and the national faith 
" pledged to carry it into effect." That the legislature and authori- 
ties of Massachusetts should have thus, in a solemn state paper of 
unusual gravity, assumed to regard as yet unacted on a measure 
that had passed into law several months before, and that by help of 
the affirmative votes of a full delegation of their own representa- 
tives, — can be accounted for onl^' by the abnormal condition of the 
public mind in that and adjacent States at that juncture. The fren- 
zied excitement that culminated in Shays's rebellion a few years 
after was then epidemic, aiiecting ruled and rulers alike. And if a 
candid and thorough investigation shall demonsfi'ate that to tliis, 
as its prime cause, must be referred the practical overthrow of com- 
mutation as the legally promised equixaknt of half pay, then will 
most, if not all, of the mystery and difficulty that have hung about 
the discussion and prosecution of these claims, be permanently 
dissipated. 

It has not been uncommon with contestants of the rights claimed 
by the officers of the Revolution, to expatiate with a considerable 
degree of respect, and even of tenderness, on the motives that 
prompted the earliest resistance to the half pay measure. Thus it 
has been intimated, rather than declared, that there was some prin- 
ciple inherent in the half pay proposition which was essentially un- 
republican and instinctively clashed with the feelings of the earnest 
devotees of popular liberty. However that might be, no satisfactory 
account, consistent with such views, has ever been rendered of the 
fact that the half pay plan was iirst proposed to Congress by no less 
an authority and no worse a republican than General Wasliington ; 
nor have they undertaken to show wherein the Congress that re- 
turned the foregoing answer to the Massachusetts coinplaints, fell 
short of being fully alive to every genuine republican and rationally 
popular sentiment. 

Not only so, but the two large States of Pennsylvania and Vir- 
ginia had previous!}^ adopted the principle of half pay in their home 
services, and surely those States were not behind any on the Conti- 
nent in sincere and ardent attachment to republican freedom in its 
every form and phase. 

But whatever credit for high principle might be accorded to the 
opponents of half pay, as such, so long as they confined their hos- 
tility to that feature alone, there is the greatest danger, if not an 
absolute certainty of their losing credit, when it is known that they 
displaj'ed their antagonism no less, but rather more, against " com- 
mutation " than against " half pay." 

Congress having yielded to clamor in procuring the abrogation of 
half pay, it came to be thought that mere clamor was all that was 
necessary to abolish " commutation" also, although commutation, 
like half pay before it, had passed on, clothed with the sanctities of 
established law. 



Hence it follows Ihat not truth merely, bnt charity as well, com- 
pels the judgment that the motives of those who strove to expunge 
" commutation," after having obliterated half pay, were wholly bad. 
Their object was not only to deprive the officers of their righteous 
due, and quite probably of any remuneration whatever (for they 
oftered nothing), but to humiliate and discredit Congress in the eyes 
of the whole country, by overawing that body to undo and repudiate 
its own acts, no matter how solemnly ordained. Doubtless the 
government of the State had no conception at the time of how nox- 
ious a reptile they were cherishing in their bosoms, but within the 
revolutions of three or four years at the utmost, the wrong and dis- 
honor they countenanced were directed back at their own authority, 
dignity, and peace, so as to demand the severest measures of re- 
pression. 

The testimonies to the fierce disregard for law and right which 
too much prevailed in those days are unquestionable and abundant. 
General Henry Knox, Avriting from New York to General Wash- 
ton, on the 23d October, 1786, says that the States "had been per- 
*' petually operating against each other and against the federal head 
" ever since the peace, (in 1782-3.) * * * Qn the very first im- 
" pression of faction and licentiousness the fine theoretic govern- 
"^,ment of Massachusetts has given way, and its laws are trampled 
" under foot, * * * The creed of the insurgents is that the 
" property of the United States has been protected from the confis- 
" cations of Britain by the joint exertions of all, and therefore ought 
•'to be the common property of all ; and he that attempts opposi- 
" to this creed is an' enemy to equality and justice, and ought to 
"be swept from the face of the earth. In a word, they are deter- 
" mined to annUulate all debts, public and private, and have agrarian 
" laws, which are easily effected by means of unfunded paper mo- 
" ney, which shall be a tender in all cases whatsoever. The num- 
" bers of these people may amount in Massachusetts to one-fifth 
•' part of several populous counties; and to them may be added the 
"people of similar sentiments from the States of Rhode Island, 
"Connecticut, and New Hampshire, so as to constitute a body of 
" 12,000 or 15,000 desperate and unpiincipled men." 

Writing to Lafiiyette, April 26, 1788, Knox says : " As to Rhode 
" Island, no little State of Greece ever exhibited greater turpitude 
" than she does. Paper money and tender law engross her atten- 
" tion entirely; this is, in other words, plundering the orphan and 
" widow by virtue of laws." 

A letter written to Gen. Washington by Gen. Nathaniel Greene, 
by a somewhat notable coincidence, on the fatal day of April 22d, 
1784, discloses in a few confidential lines the source and home of 
the trouble. Greene remarks that if the order of the Cincinnati is 
"done awa}^ the whole tide of abuse will run against tlie commu- 
" tation. The public in New England seem to want something to 
" quarrel with the officers about. Remove one thing and they will 



" find another. It is in the temper of the people, not in the mat- 
" ters eomphiined of." See also another letter of Greene's, written 
at Newport the 6th of May following. To the same general effect 
see Washington's letter to Samuel Vaughan of November 30, 1785 ; 
to Henry Lee of April 5, 1786 ; to John Jay May 18, 1786; to Da- 
vid Humphreys of December 26, 1786; to Gen. Knox of same date, 
and again of 'February 3, 1787. 

The mistake of supposing that the hostility to half pay and com- 
mutation grew out of high, strong republican sentiment, and not 
out of a purpose of being rid of that and every other public obliga- 
tion, is well illustrated in a letter of Governor Trumbull, of Con- 
necticut, addressed to Gen. Washington November 15, 1783, and 
printed in a foot note on page 6, vol. ix, of Sparks's Writings of 
Washington. The Governor records the bad state of feeling in 
Connecticut because of "their aversion to the half pay and commu- 
tation granted to the army. It is but too true," he remarks, " that 
" some few are wicked enough to hope that, by means of this 
" clamor, they may be able to rid themselves of the whole public debt, by 
" introducing so much confusion into public measures as shall even- 
" tually produce a general abolition of the whole." On this par- 
ticular head see likewise vol. ii, chap. 3, of Marshall's Life of Wash- 
ington — j)^^'^^^''^- 

From all this it appears that the legislators and peoples for whose 
special gratitication half pay had been diluted into commutation, 
became as inflamed against the latter as ever they had been against 
the former, And so tar did the Legislature of Massachusetts pro- 
ceed in the exhibition of their displeasure, that they changed and 
punished their delegation in Congress because the members of it 
had supported commutation. (Madison Papers : Letter to Thomas 
Jefftrson, August 11, 1783; and to Edward Randolph, July 21, 
1783 ; also Jour. Congress, for dates, March 22, 1783, and April 22, 
1784.) 

Nor was this entertainment of angry feeling long in producing 
its natural effect. An opportunity for gratifying it to the utmost was 
furnished on the 22d April, 1784, on the motion of Mr. Hand, of 
Pennsylvania, seconded by Mr. Jefferson, of Virginia, to appropri- 
ate for the year's interest that had accrued under the Commutation 
Act of the year before. Nothing could be plainer or more impera- 
tive than the duty of Congress to appropriate as proposed; but the 
opportunity was embraced by the enemies of commutation to nul- 
lify that whole measure, so that in point of fact it never again ap- 
peared upon the face of affairs so long as the Confederacy lasted. 
This deplorable result was favored by the peculiar organization of 
Congress at the time, whereby a minority, consisting of nine mem- 
bers, were enabled to defeat the will of a majority, consisting of 
thirteen. 

These developments, confirmatory of the suspicions and fears en- 
tertained by the onicers and mildly expressed in their memorial to 



Oons^ress anterior to the enactment of commutation — but which 
Washington had done his utmost to discredit and silence — placed 
that great and upright man in a constrained and painful position. 
The event proved the soundness of the opinions of those who had 
augured the worst, whilst it dishonored the protestations he had 
made in support of the lojal purposes of Congress. He might nat- 
urally have supposed liimself as occupying, in the eyes of the offi- 
cers, the position of one who had assisted to bring the officers into 
a situation where they were left quite helpless and at the mercy of 
their antagonists. Certain it is, that his correspondence about the 
period to which we refer, takes the highest ground in behalf of the 
officers, and puts opposition to their claims upon the basis neither of 
ignorance nor weakness, but of wickedness, pure and simple. Edwin 
Williams, the annalist, concisely describes the feelings of Wasliing- 
ton at this period: " The Revolutionary armies were disbanded lut 
" they were not paid. * * * Washington, though in retire- 
" ment, was brooding over the cruel injustice suffered by his asso- 
" ciates in arms, the warriors of the Revolution : over the prostra- 
" tion of the public credit and the faith of the nation, in the neglect 
" to provide for the payment even of the interest of the public debt." — 
(Statesman's Manual, Vol.4, page 1500. 

A more recent contribution to the early history of the Republic, 
the life of Timothy Pickering, Quartermaster General of the Revo- 
lutionary army, &c., &c., throws a strong light upon the subject. 
Writing as late as 1825, and retrospectively, Col. Pickering says, 
(Vol. 1, page 418), the Revolutionary " Army was disbanded and — 
cheated." 

At whose instance was half pay changed to commutation? 

It will be a great mistake to suppose, as some have done with 
strenuousness, and particularly Senate Report, ISTo. 101, of the Ist 
Session of the present Congress, that the change in question was 
made hy Congress at tlie officers' own request, or, " acting upon a 
" hint tendered by the officers themselves." The evidence in the case 
authorizes no such assumption, but proves the reverse. The most 
that can be adduced in its favor is where the officers in their " ad- 
dress and petition " of December, 1782, after complaining in very 
desponding terms of the destitution and " obloquy " suffered by 
their brethren who retired under the resolutions of 1780, and of 
their own gloomy prospects, express themselves " respecting haif- 
" pa}' as an honorable and just recompense for several years' hard 
" service, yet," &c., " seeing with chagrin the odious point " of view " 
in which too many " endeavor to place " it, declare themselves for 
the sake of general harmony, — and not " because they preferred a 
" round sum " for themselves, — as " willing to commute the half- 
" pay," &c. 

Had the proposal to commute really originated with the officers, 
they would have used language suitable to that state of facts ; but 



8 

the most they say is that they are " willing " to consent to some- 
thing which had evidently originated with somelody else. 

There is good reason to believe that the memorial, as we have it, 
does not express to the full the feelings and sentiments of the offi- 
cers whose cause it assumes to present. The original draft, or drafts, 
were undoubtedly pared and trimmed quite closely before presenta- 
tion to Congress. We have no less than Washington's authority 
for the fact that "address and management" v\^ere resorted to in 
furbishing the memorial, and may, therefore, justly conclude that 
the document as we read it is tamer and less outspoken than it 
would have been had the aforesaid "address and management" 
been wanting. (See Washington to Joseph Jones, 14th December, 
1782, the month of preparation of the address. Also, Waslnngton 
to Gov. Harrison of 19th March, 1783 ; and to Lafayette, the 5th of 
the month following.) 

But there is positive testimony on the point before us. The an- 
swer of Congress to the Legislature of Massachusetts, as hereinbe- 
fore cited, explicitly declares that the commutation " was jyroposed 
"by Congress and accejoted by the officers." And the language of 
Washington, both in his Circular Letter of June 8th, 1783, and his 
Farewell Address to the Army, of JSTovember 2d, 1783, implies the 
same thins;. 

Not only was the principle of commutation proposed by Congress 
to the officers — whether directly or indirectly is immaterial — but 
Congress likewise tixed the terms of it. A report to the " grand 
" committee" had put twelve years' half pay, or six years' full pav, 
as the equuudent of the half pay for life. But a sub-committee changed 
and reduced this to live years' full, or ten years' halt pay. (See Mc- 
Dougall and Ogden's letter of February 8th, 1783, in the Appendix 
to 8th vol. Sparks's Writings of Washington, page 553.) 

Did the Revolutionary Officers who were " returned " as en- 
titled to commutation, complain during their life-time 
that they had been wronged of their dues ? 

It is several times declared in Senate Report, No. 101, that they 
did not so complain, and that the presentation of claims in their be- 
half, or in behalf of their descendants, dates no further back than 
to " nearly half a centuiy " from the present time. The same re- 
port also regards it as a matter " not to be doubted, that if these 
" revolutionary officers while the}' were alive felt that they had 
" been wronged they would have made their complaints known ;" 
intending to have it inferred that the officers did not deem them- 
selves to have been wronged for that they never made complaint; 
and, of course, that having never felt wronged they had no wrongs 
to complain of 

These are singular statements to find place in a report to 



and from a Committee of the Senate, having all the records 
within its reach. Yet the report undertakes to rectify the 
mistakes and reverse the judgments of " various committees 
and members " of unsurpassed ability of both Houses of Congress, 
and advertises the purpose " to examine the question pro and con'ni 
a more judicial spirit " than heretofore. It also contidently remarks 
that " these claims do not appear to have attracted any attention 
"immediately following the adoption of our Constitution, nor for 
" many years thereafter." 

A brief reference to the records of Congress will furnish the 
readiest and best test of the accuracy of these statements. Omit- 
ting to enlarge at this place on the practical " complaint " and re- 
monstrance made by those of the " returned" ofKcers who were 
invalids, as early as within two years after the issue of the certifi- 
cates in 1783-4, and which was answered by Congress in the act of 
Septeml)er 14, 1786, it will be seen that in the very first Congress 
"following the adoption of our Cojistitiition the officers made their 
" complaints known ■' and petitioned Congress for redress. The 
first who did this were the disbanded officers of the Massachusetts 
line on the 3d August, 1790. Another petition from officers of the 
same line was presented on the 24th March, 1792. Tlien the otfi-. 
cers of the New York and Pennsylvania lines petitioned on the 18th 
December of the same j-ear. On the 20th a petition was presented 
from the Maryland line ; then on the 28th from the New Hamp- 
shire officers ; then again Massachusetts on the 31st ; Delaware on 
the 14th January, 1793 ; Rhode Island on February 6; South Caro- 
lina on February 8 ; and from the officers of the Georgia line on 
February 9; nine State lines in all. 

These petitions were respectfully received and referred, and be- 
came the subject of debate about the middle of Januarj^ 1793. 
The prayer of the petitioners was not granted, but the merit of the 
claims was free!}- and fully acknowledged, and the obligation con- 
fessed that tlie country should pay them when it could. It is to be 
noted that though this was the period of funding, yet nothing was 
said during the debates implying that any obligation had arisen 
upon the officers on account of the funding, or that their claims 
were impaired by it, or complicated with it in any respect what- 
ever. 

But the subject of the claims of the ofiicers on account of the 
refusal of Congress to keep up the credit of the certificates by pro- 
viding for the interest on them, was before Congress even prior to 
the direct i)etitions by the officers themselves. Just statesmen and 
honest patriots everywhere regretted the treatment that had been 
dealt out to the saviors of their country. Among the foremost of 
these was Mr. Madison, who introduced a resolution, into Congress 
on the 11th of February, 1790, with a view to reserve a valuable 
interest to the ofiicers in the certificates about to be called in and 
funded. Most of these certificates — early depvQciatQd to a compara-- 
2 



10 

lively insignificant amount, — were in the hands of specnlators and 
shavers, and had been bouglit for a small fraction of the face value. 
The subject was encompassed with difiiculties, because the certifi- 
cates had to a large extent changed hands and values many times 
since they had parted from the original holders; but Mr. Madison, 
intent on justice and mercy, and assisted by a sympathizing and 
able minority, labored strenuously to retain to the first owner of each 
certificate about to be funded, a fair share of its value. As a sam- 
ple of his arguments may be quoted an extract from a speech of 
his, on the aforesaid 11th of February, 1790. " The certificates (said 
" he) which had been put into the hands ot the creditors on closing 
" their settlements with the public, were of less real value than was 
" acknowledged to be due; they may be considered as having been 
^\forced, in fact, on the receivers. Tliey cannot, therefore, be fairly 
" judged an extinguishment of the debt. * * * * 'pi^e sufter- 
" ings of the military fart of the creditors can never be forgotten 
" while sympathy is an American virtue, to say nothing of the sin- 
" gular hardship in so many mouths of requiring those who have 
*' lost four-fitths, or seven-eighths, of their due, to contribute the 
" remainder in favor of those who have gained in the contrary pro- 
." portion. Hence, (Annals of Congress, page 1515) either pay 
" both ; reject wholly one or the other ; or make a composition be- 
" tween them on some principles of equity. To make the oflicers 
" the sole victims, is an idea at which human nature recoils." 

On the 18th February, Mr. Madison remarked that he regarded "the 
" claims of the original holders of the certificates as having been 
" invalidated by nothing yet urged (in the debate). A debt was 
" fairly contracted; according to justice and good faith it ought to 
" have been paid in gold and silver; a piece of paper only was sub- 
" stituted. Was this paper equal in value to gold or silver ? No ! 
" It was worth in the market * * * no more than one-eighth 
" or one-seventh of that value. Was this depreciated paper freely 
" accepted? No ! The government ottered that or nothing. The 
" relation of the individual to the government, and the circum- 
" stances of the ofler, rendered the acceptance a forced and not a 
" free one. The same degree of constraint would vitiate a trans- 
" action between man and man before any court of equity on the 
" face of the earth, * * * Here, then, was a debt, acknowl- 
•' edged to have been once due and which was never discharged, be- 
" cause the payment was forced and defective. * * * The injus- 
" tice which has taken place has been enormous and flagrant, and 
" makes redress a great national object." (See Madison's letter to 
Jefierson, February 14, 1790; to Fdmund Pendleton March 4; and 
to Dr. Rush, March 7, 1790.) 

Mr. Madison furthermore declared (page 1266) that the denial of 
justice to the officers was "■ a failure to fulfil the direct and express 
" obligatiors of the public; " and on page 1268, "a government 
*' ought to redress the wrongs sustained by its default," 



11 

No member, whether he voted for or against Mr. Madison's resolu- 
tion appears to have contested these statements. Thus, Mr. Boudinot, 
ot New Jersey, who finally voted in the negative, said (page 1248), 
" that the original holder of the certificate is injured, I acknovvl- 
" edge. But, by whom ? The United States " (and not the present 
holder who had innocently bought). Again, Mr. Boudinot admitted 
(page 1253) that " the original holder received but one and six pence 
in t'lie pound (^^^o) ^^ his just due.'' (See also Mr. Boudinot's re- 
marks on the 10th February, on the nature of the certificates. 

Mr. Stone, of Maryland, said (pages 1258 and 60) : " I take it to 
^' he a granted poinl that (the certificates) were not a payment, but 
" an obligation to pay whenever the United States should be able. 
" * * * The soldier (officer) tells you that he has done service 
" to a co)isiderable amount, for which he has never been paid, and 
" that those evidences of the debt which you gave to him were ob- 
" tained from him for one-tenth of what they were declared to be 
" worth." Mr. Scott, of Pennsylvania, said (page 1272) : " If 
" those papers (the certificates) are evidences of anything, it is of a 
'-'■ pre-existivg contract broken. * * * What did Congress offer? 
" Paper of the nominal value of twenty shillings, but of no more 
" real value than two-and-sixpence." Mr. Seney, of Maryland, de- 
clared " the contract as only partly complied with by the govern- 
" ment, and the residue still remained undischarged." The certifi- 
cates were " paper of inconsiderable value /onw/ on the oflicers by 
" the public, and depreciated by their (the public's) acts." 

Mr. Gerry, of Massachusetts, speaking (page 1281) of the value 
of the certificates as only two-and-sixpence in the pound, asked if 
" this was a fulfilment ot the contract? Was ever a brave army so 
*' paid before ? " And on page 1285, the same speaker again asked: 
" If enquiry be made, what is to be done with the suffering soldiers? 
" I answer, pay them if your funds are sufficient; if not, assure 
"them you will do it as soon as funds can be provided." And Mr. 
Lawrence, of New York, made (on page 1289) the acute and 
important remark, that " one of the great causes which brought 
" about the last revolution [i. e., the adoption of the Constitution) 
" was a desire which pervaded the community of securing the per- 
" formance of the public contracts ;" thereby intending that the 
adoption of our present Constitution was to be understood as a 
guaranty of the full discharge of the debt due the officers. The 
statement of Mr. White, of Virginia, on the 16th February, is valu- 
able as a lucid exposition of the circumstances attending the sale of 
their certificates by the destitute officers. 

But the history of the year 1790 is fraught with yet other testi- 
monies to the merit of the disbanded officers' claims. In the course 
of the month of June, the officers of the navy memorialized Con- 
gress for half pay or commutation on the system proposed for the 
officers of the army. But this request was speedily met and dis- 
posed of Mr. Sedgwick, of Massachusetts, promptly expressed the 



12 

general jiiclirment of Congress that the officers of the navy had no 
legal or eqnitahle claim on the government, differing in this respect 
from the oiiicers of the army, whose chiiin was " on the ground of 
contract," and such as " we are under the most solemn obligation^ if 
in our power, to fuliil." This was the same gentleman who, almost 
three years after, viz., January 14, 1793, expressed an entertainment 
of the "most respectful opinion of those brave and meritorious citi- 
" zens " (the officers of the revolutionary army), and alleged that 
" no man would more regret than himself that their services should 
" remain unremuneraied." 

Some remark? by Mr. Fisher Ames, of Massachusetts, in May, 
1790, confirm our idea of the universal opinion then entertained of 
the intrinsic merit of these claims. " As it respects (said Mr. Ames) 
" the ami}' debt, the very terms of the bargain bind ihe United 
" States. In this instance, not only justice but your plighted faith 
" requires you to pay. You have asked the officer's services and 
" had them; " and then, as if apostrophizing the officers in person, 
he continued : " You shed your blood for us ; by your valor we 
" sit here ; we have seen your wrongs, and when it would do you 
" no good, because we had no power, we told the world how deeply 
" we lamented them. Bui go home and starve ! " 

It may not be uninteresting also, to know what that able and 
many-gifted man, Alexander Hamilton, thought on this subject. 
His celebrated report on the finances, funding, &c. (found at page 
1991, Vol. 2, of the Annals of Congress), has several allusions to it. 
Thus (and it is confirmatory of what has been already stated in 
this report of the peculiar organization of the old Congress), he 
says : 

" The laudable effort to retrieve the national credit by doing jus- 
" tice to the creditors of the nation, had been defeated by the em- 
" barrassments of a defective Constitution." Again, " The neces- 
" sit3' the seller (of the certificates) was under, was occasioned by the 
" Government in not making a proper provision for its debts." And 
further, " That the case of those who parted with their securities 
" from nece-sity is a hard one, cannot be denied. But whatever 
*' complaint of injury or clo.im. of redress they may have, respects the 
" Government solely ; " (and not the purchasers of the certificates). 
These pregnant sentences cover the whole ground, and fix the entire 
responsibility for the downfall of commutation upon the Govern- 
ment. 

On December 1st, 1807, the memorable John Randolph of Roa- 
noke, introduced a measure into the House of Representatives 
calling for a provision for an adequate and comfortable support of 
the indigent revolutionarj' officers and soldiers, their then conditi(m 
being in his judgment "disgraceful to the country which owed its 
" liberties to their valor." He expressed himself unwilling that 
" the fruits of the revolution should enure to the sole benefit of 



13 

" those (speculators in certificates, &c.) " who never put their per- 
" sons to hazard, or even spent one dolhar for the acquisition of 
" our independence." His remarks on the day following are for 
the most part spirited and just, and though not directed to a meas- 
ure precisely lilve the present bill, have still a bearing upon it. 

The report of the Hon. Mr. Morrill states, at page 7, that during 
the presidency of Mr. Jefferson, '' our prosperity was too great to 
" allow us to plead poverty as the excuse for the non-payment of 
" any just demands; " " that there were no visible debts or obliga- 
" tions which we were too poor to pay ; " " that neither the Grov- 
" ernment of the United States nor revolutionary officers had then 
" dreamed of the possibility of any farther claim which could ever 
"arise out of the last final adjustment" in 1783, and " if we 
" slighted au}^ just and equitable demands of revolutionary officers, 
" we cannot plead that it was our poverty and not our ivill that con- 
" sented to the slight." 

If now it should be shown, in addition to what has been already 
adduced, that during Mr. Jefferson's administration revolution- 
ary officers not only " dreamed of," but actually presented to Con- 
gress " claims which arose out of the adjustment " in 1783, might 
it not follow, from the very reasoning of Mr. Morrill's report itself, 
that it was just the want of disposition, perhaps; the want of 
" will " simply, that was in the way of our settling the revolution- 
ary officers' "just and equitable demands? " 

On the 1st December, 1808, Mr. Jeremiah Morrow, of Ohio, 
presented to the House of Representatives a memorial for redress 
from revolutionary officers residing in his State ; and on the same 
day Mr. Samuel Smith, of Pennsylvania, presented a similar peti- 
tion from officers of the old Pennsylvania line. Six days after, 
Mr. Lay, of Pennsylvania, presented a like petition from officers of 
the revolution from Pennsylvania, and Mr. Wharton, of Tennessee, 
followed with similar petitions from officers of the Massachusetts, 
Pennsylvania, Virginia, and I^orth Carolina lines. Six days later, 
again, Mr. Mumford, of jS'ew York, did the same for officers both 
of the army and navy in New York. These petitions were all re- 
ferred on the 26th December, to a committee of nine, but there 
does not appear to have been "will " enough in the committee to 
make a report, for none such is recorded — at any rate the omission 
wears much of the appearance of the inexcusable " slight " sug- 
gested by Mr. Morrill. 

On the 5th January, 1809 (still within Mr. Jefferson's term,) Mr. 
Van Dyke, of Delaware, presented a memorial from the old Dela- 
ware line asking redress of their wrongs. The same thing was 
done on the 10th by Mr. Nicholas, of Virginia, for officers of the 
Virginia line, and on the 13th, Mr. Mumford presented a further 
memorial from army and navy officers in New York. These me- 
morials were referred to a committee of five, of which Mr. Nelson, 



14 

of Maryland, was chairman, and from it came a report, on the 31st 
January, 1810, jiistif)'ing' the array chiims, and recommending their 
payment. (See this report at page 1356, Annals of Congress for 
the year.) 

A further petition from revolutionary officers in Virginia, pray- 
ing for half pay during life was presented in the House of Repre- 
sentatives on the 27th March, 1810, and the 24th December follow- 
ing, several like memorials were presented and referred to a select 
committee of which Mr, Sheffey, of Virginia, was chairman. But 
the troubles with England were thickening; war was becoming 
imminent; and something like a fair " excuse " was presented for 
postponing the claims to a more convenient season. The claims 
accordingly passed under the occultation of a new war, and did not 
emerge again during the lifetime of many of the petitioners. 

Within two or three years after the close of the war of 1812, me- 
morials from them surviving officers began to be presented to Con- 
gress. These were duly referred in the House of Representatives 
to a committee, of which Mr. Richard M. Johnson of Kentucky (dis- 
tinguished in the last closed war) was chairman. The committee 
reported on the 7th December, 1818, and favorably to the claimants. 
The will of Congress was, however, still obdurate, and its ear deaf 
to the calls of justice and the appeals of the country's old defenders. 
The officers were, nevertheless, too well assured of the rightfulness 
of their claims, to be wholly silenced. They persevered in their 
appeals, and another report was made in answer (December 10th, 
1819) by a House committee, of which Mr. Sargeant of Pennsylva- 
nia was chairman. It was all the surmving officers could reasonably 
expect, though it left unprovided for the equally sacred rights of the 
deceased. The bill came up for consideration on the 14th April, 
1820, but was dismissed after one day's debate. The will of Con- 
gress was yet unmoved. 

In the year 1825 the surviving officers resolved on yet another ef- 
fort to obtain the long-denied justice of their country. Those in 
Rhode Island, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and South 
Carolina sent delegates to a convention which met in Philadelphia, 
wdio " agreed to present a respectful memorial once more to Congress," 
asking a settlement of their claims upon the " principles of justice 
and equity." Bills were introduced and reports made in both 
branches of Congress. These were highly favorable to the cause of 
the surviving claimants, the arguments and appeals being grounded 
upon the original rights of all the officers (living and deceased) under 
the act of October 21st, 1780, and the Commutation Act of March 
22d, 1783, neither of which was complied with by Congress or the 
country. 



15 

[Having gone thus far under one head, it may be as well as not, to 
complete herein the Congressional history of the v>roseention of 
these claims fully up to the pr,esent Congress. By this means a 
better survey of the whole subject will be obtained, and thorough 
investigation facilitated.] 

Taking up again the thread of the effort of 1825, it is to be re- 
marked that on the 9th December, 1825, Mr. Hemphill of Pennsyl- 
vania presented to the House of Representatives the petition of the 
delegates who had met in Philadeli>hia on behalf of the officers. He 
asked for a select committee on the ground that there was no exist- 
ing committee special to the subject of Revolutionarj^ claims, and 
instanced the appointment of select committess on the subject in 1810 
and 1819, and on the similar case of General Lafayette. A select 
committee of seven members was then appointed, with Mr. Hemp- 
hill as chairman. On the 3d January, 1825, he made a report ac- 
companied by a bill, which was read a first and second time and re- 
ferred to a Committee of the Whole House. It came forward April 
24th, 1826, the 2d section providing against any payment to foreign 
officers, who had been provided for more than thirty years before. 
Mr. Hemphill spoke at length on the bill. He was followed on the 
same side by Mr. Smith of Pennsylvania, Mr. Anderson of Maine 
and Mr. Buchanan of Pennsylvania, in speeches showing much re- 
search and examination of the subject. All the spealcers regarded 
the measure as one of deep interest and importance; and Mr. Buch- 
anan believed that by a " refusal to pay so meritorious a debt, the 
nation would be disgraced." The petitioners, and the officers at 
large, had performed their part of the contract, to the letter, " whilst 
the country had violated all its obligations." The officers, " in his 
" opinion, had a better claim to receive what the bill contemplated 
" giving them, than any of us (Congressmen) have to our eight dol- 
" lars a day." Mr. Humphrey, of New York, in a discriminating and 
forcible speech, declared that, " under a full sense of duty, and with 
" a conscientious regard to his obligation to the Government, he had 
" examined and reflected upon the circumstances of the case, and 
" his mind had been irresistibly drawn to the conclusion that the 
" claim of the memorialists is founded in justice and equity." He 
expressed his duubts about the Commutation Act of 1783 being 
honestly designed to do what seems to stand upon its face. Besides 
Mr. Humphrey there were other speakers on the same side, and 
three on the opposite, viz. Mr. Mitchell of Tennessee, McCoy of 
Virginia, and Alston of North Carolina. The points of objection 
made by these, were, that the bill ought to include the descendants 
of the deceased officers, whose rights were as good as the rights of 
those that survived ; that the common soldiers and even the militia 
of the States ought to come in ; that the cost of the bill would be 
very great ; and that if the officers suffered by the depreciation of 
their certificates, so did everybody suffer by the depreciation of 
the Continental money. 



16 

On the 25th April, Mr. Drayton of South Carolina, replied to the 
several objections, and was followed by Mr. Spragiie of Maine, in 
behalf of a provision for the other ranks of the army besides the 
" returned " officers. In answer to Mr. Alston's objection to the 
great cost, Mr. Sprague said, that rather than not pay so just and 
righteous a debt, he would " bar all Oregon establishments, stop 
" short in oar roads, canals and railways, and even pause in our 
" S3'steni of fortifications for national defence." Mr. Everett of 
Massachusetts, took warmly up the objections that had been urged, 
and replied to them with his usual ability. On the 2d May, Mr. 
Thompson of Georgia opposed the bill, chiefly on the ground that 
it ouglit to include all the meritorious participants in the Revolu- 
tionary struggle ; to which it was answered that the bill went on 
the principle of contract, not of generosity. 

The bill was at length referred to the Committee on Military 
Pensions, from which an amendatory bill was reported by Mr. 
Burges, its chairman. It came before the House in committee on 
the 4th January, 1827, when Mr. Burges fully explained the meas- 
ure. The day after, Mr. Mitchell of Tennessee, repeated his objec- 
tions, to which Mr. Webster of Massachusetts, replied, and illumined 
the subject. On the 8th January, Mr. Tucker of South Carolina, 
again urged the claims of the heirs and representatives of the 
deceased officers. On the 11th he spoke again, and advocated put- 
ting militia officers also into the bill ; he also advanced the fond but 
erroneous idea that the proposal for commutation originated with 
the officers. Mr. Dorsey of Maryland, replied with much point and 
vigor. Mr. Drayton also addressed himself to the speech of his 
colleague, Mr. Tucker, In particular he exploded (page 661) the 
sophism which sought to identify the depreciation on the commuta- 
tion certiticates with the general depreciation of the continental 
money; two matters entirely different and distinct. He contrasted 
(page 664) the good faith kept with the foreign officers with the 
cruel treatment to the native; though the services and merits of 
the latter were at least equal to those of theiormer. Mr. Alston re- 
joined, and the next day Mr. Mitchell renewed his wish to extend relief 
to soldiers, partizans and militia. Mr. Mitchell, of South Carolina, 
wanted to include the representatives of deceased officers. Mr. 
Buchanan again stood up in explanation and defence of the measure, 
and Mr. Webster also came earnestly forth in its behalf. " I feel," 
said the latter, " that the claim is just, that the honor of the country 
" is connected with it." " I must proclaim to this House and to the 
" Nation, the convictions which inhabit my breast. I saj-, without 
" hesitation, as a laivi/er, that the claim of those officers under the 
" resolutions of 1780 and 1783 is a claim not yet satisfied, and which 
<' would recommend itself for compensation and payment to the 
" conscience of any Chancellor in the world." Could a suit at law 
be instituted in which the officers and United States were opposing 
parties, " no advocate of standing and character would advise the 
" United States that they had a defence." 



17 

Mr. Tucker had moved to recommit the bill, but this the House 
refused, when Mr. Wickliife, of Kentucky, moved to amend so as to 
include in the bill provision for the heirs and legal representatives 
of the deceased otiicers. On t\ e 13th January, 1826, he supported 
his motion by a speech, in which he argued that if the Government 
was indebted to the surviving officers on account oi contract, it could 
be no less indebted to the otticers who were deceased, and therefore 
to their living representatives. To pay all, he thought, would re- 
quire five millions of dollars, but, " Be the sum great or small, if it 
*' be due to the survivors it is equally due the heirs, and, if you pay 
" one, I am for paying the others." "I cannot consent to the unjust 
*' discrimination made by the provisions of this bill." " Permit me, 
" in conclusion, to say, that the claims of the oificers and soldiers of 
"the Revolution address themselves forcibly to my judgment. Place 
"them upon their true basis of contract; ascertain what is due to 
" each and to all, and I will pay to the uttermost farthing." 

Mr. Test, of Indiana, was opposed "m tofo," to the bill, yet he agreed 
with Mr. Wicklifte that if the Government " really owed a debt to 
" an officer, his death cannot absolve us from that obligation. It can 
" only transmit it to his heirs. If we were really indebted to the father 
" we are bound by every legal and moral obligation to discharge it 
" to his children and legal representatives, alter his death." Mr. 
T. wished to include the soldiers, and repeated the mistake, com- 
mitted by many others, that the commutation scheme originated with 
the ofli<jer8 and was proposed by them to Congress ; which body, he 
said, " rather reluctantly agreed " to it. Mr. Clarke, of Kentucky, 
was of the same general opinion as the two preceding speakers re- 
garding the rights of the heirs. During his speech he stated his be- 
lief that the average age of the officers at disbandonment was 35 
years. Mr. Sprague acknowledged the equal rights of the deceased 
ofiBcers, but held it impossible to pay all. In choosing, therefore, 
he preferred to pay the living. Mr. Drayton made the same admis- 
sion, and said that to include the legal representatives of the de- 
ceased would make the bill worthless to all. On the 15th January 
Mr. Weems, of Maryland, spoke in censure of the insidious methods 
devised to destroy the bill. Mr. Everett again spoke in support of 
the measure. Mr. Livingston, of Louisiana, in a vigorous speech, 
enforced and applauded the remarks of Mr. Webster. He regarded 
"the first contract for half pay for life shamelessly broken," and as 
to the second, it was sought to be discharged in " paper without se- 
" curity, worthless paper, snatched from the hands of the starving 
" ofiicer for a morsel of bread." He opposed Mr. Wicklift'e's amend- 
ment, but the House sustained it by a vote of 101 to 80. An effort 
was made by Mr. Cobb, ot Georgia, to defeat the bill by " indefinite 
postponement," but it failed, and the bill was recommitted. 

On the 22d January Mr. Burges moved to go into Committee of 
the Whole on the bill. Mr. Condict proposed a modification. On 
■the 4th December following, the last named presented a memorial 
S 



18 

from Ogden and Bradford, on behalf of the officers, which was re- 
ferred to a select committee of seven, with Mr. Barges for chair- 
man. He reported on the 11th of February, together with a bill, 
which was read twice and committed to a Committee of the Whole 
House. It came up for consideration on the 8th May, 1828, on mo- 
tion of Mr. Taylor, of New York. Eleven speakers advocated and 
two opposed the bill. The only speech reported is that of Mr. Tucker 
of New Jersey. Mr. Mitchell, of Tennessee, moved to restrict the 
beneiits of the bill to those officers worth less than $5,000. This was 
lost by 3'ea8 31, na^-s 91. Mr. Gilmer, of Georgia, moved to restrict 
the bill to those officers whose service began prior to 1778. Mr. 
Sterigere, of Pennsylvania, defended the bill. When the committee 
sat again on the 12th May, it had before it the bill that had passed 
the Senate on the 29th ultimo. Mr. Gilmer's motion was negatived 
and a motion was ottered to exclude all who had received a pension. 
Seven speakers opposed this, and two advocated it. The speeches of 
Mr. Weems, and Mr. Tracy, of Connecticut only are reported. Much 
eftbrt was made to embarrass the measure. Mr. Drayton again 
spoke in favor of the bill, and was followed by Mr. S. Wood, of Ohio, 
at much length, when a vote on the question was taken on the 30th 
May, and the bill passed by yeas 115, nays 58. It was approved by 
the President on the 15th. 

In the Senate proceedings began 20th December, 1825, when Mr. 
Hayne, of South Carolina, presented the memorial of the officers 
that had met at Philadelphia. It was referred to a select commit- 
tee of seven, of whom Mr. Mills, of Massachusetts, was chairman. 
A report, accompanied by a bill, was made on the 7th February, 
1826. The bill was read twice ; came up again on the 28th March, 
and on the 6th May was laid on the table. Another memorial, by 
Ogden and Bradford, was presented on the 15th December, 1827. 
(See it in Senate Reserved Documents. It was referred to a select 
committee of hve, consisting of Messrs. Woodbury, of New Hamp- 
shire, Harrison, of Ohio, afterwards President, Berrien, of Georgia, 
Van Buren, of New York, and Webster, of Massachusetts, now be- 
come a Senator. They reported on the 3d January, 1828, for which 
report see also Senate Reserved Documents.) A bill accompanied 
the report. On the 24th January Mr. Woodbury moved to till a 
blank in the bill with a sum which he named, and on this motion 
proceeded to discuss the measure. His speech was worthy of the 
speaker. Mr. Chandler, of Maine, after the manner of opponents 
in the House, proposed to include soldiers and the legal represent- 
atives of deceased officers. Mr. Woodbury replied. Mr. Branch, 
of North Carolina, held the same views, substantially, as Mr. Chan- 
dler. To him, Mr. Harrison replied fully, and with zeal. Mr. 
Chandler rejoining, and repeating the views of Mr. WicklitFe of 
the House, said he "desired to do justice. If the country owed the 
" officers anything, let it be paid to the utmost farthing." Mr. 
Parris, of Maine, wished to include the soldiers, from which Mr. 
Van Buren strongly dissented, because the bill was designed " to 



19 

" liquidate a debt, and not to settle all the accounts of the Revolu- 
" tion." Mr. Parris reproduced his views on the 28th January, and 
Mr. Van Buren as^ain replied to him. Air. Parris, with Mr. Rug- 
gles, of Ohio, liaving urged certain objections, were encountered 
by Mr. Chambers, of Maryland. On the 29th Mr. Smith, of South 
Carolina, declared at great length for the equal rights of the wid- 
ows and orphans of the deceased officers with the surviving officers. 
"If," said he, " this be a debt of obligation, founded on contract, 
**tothe survivors, it is equally a debt of obligation, founded on 
*' contract, to the legal representatives of the deceased. It would 
*' be a perversion of one of the soundest maxims of law to suppose 
" that the death of a creditor cancels the debt or lessens the obliga- 
*' tions of the debtor." Mr. Smith having erred on several points of 
fact, was replied to by Mr. Charabersi Mr. Bobbins, of Rhode 
Island, thought the bill could not be justified except as standing 
upon the basis of legal obligation. He then argued that it stood on 
that basis. On the 30th Mr. Berrien advocated the bill, and his 
colleague, Mr. Cobb, opposed it, saying, also, that it was an admin- 
istration measure, the President having recommended it in his an- 
nual message. Mr. C. acknowledged that the officers had sold their 
certificates at " immense discounts." On the 31st Mr. Smith spoke 
at "considerable," and Mr. Van Buren replied at " great " length. 
The next day Messrs. Branch and Macon, of North Carolina, op- 
posed the bill. Mr. Tyler, of Virginia, did the same; but agreed 
that if " in virtue of contracts during the Revolutionary War, 
" the Government stands indebted to the officers, it is our solemn 
" duty at once to cancel the debt; but if it be so, then, sir, I should 
" be led to blush for my countr3^ Deep is the stain which rests 
" upon its honor. For nearly half a century it has been guilty of 
"the gross injustice of withholding from the hardy veteran of the 
" Revolution the earnings of his toil and blood," and more to the 
same effect. Interesting and acute as was Mr. Tyler's speech, it 
had the misfortune of being a good deal dotted over with errors of 
fact and testimony, showing imperfect research. More thorough 
inquiry might have made him a hearty advocate of the bill. 

The next debate on the bill was on the 11th March, when Mr. 
Harrison made a general answer to its opponents. Mr. Robbins 
again insisted on the legal obligation to pay, resting on the country. 
In his judgment the " contract with the officers had been violated, 
" and to their wrong, for which they are legally entitled to indera- 
" nification." Mr. Chandler intimated a willingness to support the 
bill if provision were made in it for the soldiers. Mr. Hayne ear- 
nestly advocated the measure, and thought that some of the " objec- 
" tions urged against it constituted arguments in its favor." Mr. 
Bell, of New Hampshire, spoke in opposition ; whereupon Mr. 
"Woodbury well remarked that he was " convinced that some of the 
" opponents of the measure acted under a total misapprehension as 
" to a few of the material facta. The particular facts ought surely 



20 

" to be better known to those whose particular dnty it had been to 
" make a critical examination of them." Mr. Woodbury corrected 
some of these misapprehensions. The bill was then laid on the 
table, and taken up again on the 25th April, on a substitute for the 
original bill. Debaters were numerous and keen. Mr. Cobb op- 
posed, and Mr. Chambers answered him. Mr, Webster replied to 
objectors generally. Mr, Foot, of Connecticut, spoke in opposition, 
and Mr. White, of Tennessee, favorably to the bill. Finally, on 
the 28th, the substitute was adopted by a vote of 30 to 17, and the 
next day read a third time and passed, and sent to the House of 
Representatives for concurrence. 

Senate Report, No, 101, is much at fault in supposing (at page 10) 
that the act of 15th May, 1828, was designed, so far as the officers 
are concerned, as a gratuity or additional " mark of reverence and 
*' gratitude," and not as an " offset " or relief from the wrongs of 
commutation. The debates on the bill show that it never could 
have passed as a mere gratuity, except to the soldiers, Tlie officers 
had not asked relief on the score of gift but upon " principles of 
justice and equity." And so the speakers in Congress, on both 
sides, dwelt on "contract," "justice," " legal obligation," "debt," 
" indemnification," " violated " faith on the part of the government, 
and the like. The passage of the act was an acknowledgement of 
debt, a debt which is yet but very partially paid. 

[It will be a great mistake, and no small injustice to Mr. Webster, to interpret his 
closing remarks on the 25th April, 1H28, as the expression of a change of sentiment on 
the subject of the rights and claims of the officers of the revolution, under the acts of 
October 21, 1780, and March 22, 1783. So far from that, he refers to his previously 
uttered and well known opinions thereupon, and tiiereby reiterates them. AVhat he 
did on the 25th April, 1828. was to attempt to mitigate the fierce opposition of the foes 
of the Survivors' bill then before the Senate, by admitting^which was true enough — 
that the bill, as it then stood, after the numerous changes that had been made in it, 
•was not wholly one of "justice and equitv," as prayed for by the petitioning officers, 
but had become partly, also, "' bounty or gratuity." Under the new shape the bill had 
assumed, whereby noncommissioned officers and soldiers (who had not petitioned and 
preferred no claim) were to be donated with life incomes, Mr. Webster was justified in 
adopting the policy he did. He rightly said that the bill, in its then form, was '^ n mixed 
claim of faith and public gratitude; of justice and honorable bounty; of merit and 
benevolence;" and thus, doubtless, he powerfully assisted its passage. No friend of 
the just claims of the officers, proposed, or even so much as dreamed of reopening all 
the accounts of the revolution; nor was the loading down of the Survivors' bill their 
work ; it is, however, impossible to deny that if the surviving officers had a claim of 
"ment" upon the "faith" and "justice" of the country, the deceased officers (by 
their living representatives) had no less, and this Mr. Webster both saw and acknow- 
ledged.] 

But this very subject has been under consideration by high legal 
authority, Atrorney General B, F. Butler, in an opinion of his of 
date February 3, 1834, states (pages 599 and 603) that the act of 
Ma}' 15, 1828, treated the officers and soldiers provided for " as 
" having a claim on the justice of the nation, and not merely as ob- 
"jects of its bounty; the moneys directed to be paid to them are de- 
" nominated pay and not pensions; and those moneys are to be paid 
" to all who have performed the requisite service.'^ Thus the suppo- 
sition of Senate Report, No. 101, stands reversed. 



21 

The Committee of the House of Representatives, of which Mr. 
Johnson, of Kentneky, was Chairman, state in their report of the 
7th of December, 1818, that " npon the view taken by the memorial- 
" ists (viz., of contract and simple debt), the committee could not 
" see any justice in confining the praj^er of the petitioners to those 
"only who still survive. To provide for those upon the principle 
*' of justice and legal obligation, and suffer the dead to be forgot- 
" ten, would be but a partial remuneration ; the heirs of the de- 
" ceased would have equal claims upon the government as the offi- 
*' cers who survive." The debates in Congress, preceding the pas- 
*' sage of the act May 15, 1823, show the entartainiiient of the same 
opinion by all the speakers ; though, if possible, more decidedly by 
the opponents than by the friends of the measure. Petitions, there- 
fore, found their way into Congress from numerous heirs and legal 
representatives of deceased officers, asking special relief by way of 
half pay or commutation. In special acts, passed within the twenty 
years or so after 1828, interest was allowed on the deferred debt in 
some and not in others. It is believed that very few of these re- 
lieved cases were cases of " returned " officers, such as are pro- 
vided for in the present House Bill 3694. It was therefore felt by 
members of both Houses that some general act should be provided 
which would cover all the cases of officers to whom the government 
had been indebted by contract, and relieve Congress from much 
perplexing and unnecessary labor. A report (No. 82) suggested by 
an aggregation of above forty cases before the Committee of Revo- 
lutionary Claims of the Senate, was made on the 6th February, 
1854, accompanied by a bill (No, 186) through its Chairman, Mr. 
Evans, of South Carolina. Before this date, however, two impor- 
tant reports had been made. One of these was House report (No. 
887) by Mr. Taliaferro, of Virginia, dated May 11, 1838, in the case 
of Keene's heirs : the other was Senate Report (No. 164) of date April 
5, 1852, by a committee composed of Senators Walker, James, 
Sumner, Foot and Chase, on a petition by the heirs of Benjamin 
Mooers. Both warmly justified the claims in general and particular. 

Mr. Evans' bill (No. 186) was twice read on the 6th February, 
1854, and referred. It came forward again March 21st, and again 
March 23d, 1854, when Mr. Evans explained it in foil. Again, on 
the 18th April, 1854, subsequently to the insertion of a proviso and 
the withdravval of an amendment, Mr. Cass (of Michigan) rather 
disfavored the bill. Mr. Evans followed, correcting some of Mr. 
Cass' mistakes of fact. Mr. Walker (of Wisconsin) showed that 
the measure was in no way complicated with the subject of the 
general depreciation of the Continental money (in which officers 
and all suffered alike) but grew out of a particular and specific con- 
tract, to be fortified by securities, between Congress and the offi- 
cers. Mr. W. declared it was his purpose to " do no more than 
" legal justice to the officers of the Revolution." Mr. Cass rejoined, 
and admitted that " you may consider it, if you please, a breach of 



22 

" faith that it was not paid, but it was not paid because the govern- 
" ment had no means with which to pay." 

[Had Mr. Cass understood that the true fault with the old Con- 
gress was not its want of means to pay the claim, — which Wash- 
ington said in his circular of June 8, 1783, it could undoubtedly 
do", — but its refusal to appropriate for the annual interest so as to 
keep up the credit of its paper and thereby enable the othcers to 
sell at or near par; he would not have uttered words quite beside 
the mark and to little or no purpose.] 

Mr. Cass further said that " not a dollar of the Continental 
" money was ever funded. It died in the hands of the community." 

[In this Mr. Cass furnished a perfect answer to his previous mis- 
taken position. If the Continental money was never funded it 
widely differed from the certificates, which were funded. And so 
far from the certificates " dying," they became the foundation of 
great national recuperation and prosperity, though they had been 
substantially filched from their original holders by the " insatiate 
harpies " that most benefitted by them. Like many other talkers 
and writers on the subject of these claims, Mr. Cass would have 
done better if he had kn-own more, and more correctly.] 

Mr. Walker followed Mr. Cass in explanation and defense of the bill. 
The bill was again called up on the 25th July, 1854, but was sent 
over to the first Monday of the next session. 

Ou the 24th January, 1855, Mr. Evans made an effort to bring the 
bill forward, thinking it " entitled to preference overall other bills." 
But another question was taken up and the claims bill was deferred 
to the 22d February. Mr. Seward, of New York, announced the 
day to be the anniversary of the birth of the Father of his country, 
and the bill was " an old subject. It concerns the payment of just 
*' claims of the relics of the revolutionary war, and we cannot do a 
" better thing than pass the bill on this day, even though it should 
" involve the payment of a large amount of money." Mr. Shields, 
of Minnesota, said that "justice requires that the bill should be 
acted on," As to the amount, Mr. Evans said it might amount to 
four millions but could not possibly exceed six. Mr. Slidell, of 
Louisiana, stated his opposition to the bill, and Mr. Pettit, of Indiana, 
asked contemptously if any of the money under it would go to the 
descendants of the Hessians? Mr. Evans answered that it covered 
" no classes except those to whom Congress had promised half pay." 
The bill then passed by yeas 26, nays 15. 

On the 4th March, 1856, Mr. Broom, of Pennsylvania, gave notice 
in th.e House of Representatives of his intention to introduce a bill 
for the payment of the claims. This was done that day week, when 
the bill was twice read and referred to the Committee on Revolu- 
tionary Pensions. It was reported on the 4th April, (Report No. 
81, 34th Congress, 1st session) with a bill (No. 154). On the 7th 



23 

July, 1856, Mr. Broom got the bill np in Committee of the Whole. 
Mr. Millson, of Virginia, somewhat opposed the bill. Mr. Broom 
replied. Mr. Craige, of North Carolina, wished to include militia 
officers and soldiers, not indicating a close comprehension of the 
peculiar facts involved. Mr. Humphrey Marshall, of Kentucky, 
earnestly favored the bill, and contended that the act of loth May, 
1828, was " a confession on the part of the Congress of the United 
" States that the officers had been cheated by the act of 1783." He 
alluded to action by Congress on a particular claim, (Mrs. Lynch's) 
and declared his disregard of the amount of money called for; no 
matter if it " took ten, or fifteen, or fifty millions," the bill ought 
to pass. Mr. Broom moved to discharge the Committee from its 
further consideration, when by a vote of 111 to 54, it was ordered 
to be en2;rossed and read a third time. But this was reconsidered 
and the bill went to the Speaker's table. On the 29th July Mr. 
William Smith, of Virginia, called up the motion to reconsider and 
moved the previous question, when the House went into Committee 
of the Whole. 

The next day, the 30th, the first business was on the reconsidera- 
tion of the vote on engrossing and reading the third time, which 
was laid on the table. The bill was engrossed and read a third time, 
wdien Mr. Smith moved the previous question, wdiich Mr, Phelps of 
Missouri moved to lay on the table. This was lost by yeas 61, nays 
105. Messrs. Craige and Jones, of Tennessee, assailed the bill, but 
were answered by Mr. Broom, who said, " If the Commutation Act 
" was passed in good faith then I contend that the government 
" should have carried it out in good faith ; and not having yet done 
" so, the opportunity is now presented by this bill. All the com- 
" mittees reported that the contract had not been complied with ; 
" and I can but consider it a burning shame on the character and 
"integrity of the United States that an act of such clear justice 
" should have so long remained unheeded, uneared for, and unpro- 
" vided for, by a government professing to be a government of 
" honor." Mr. Craige objected that the bill proposed no interest, 
when Mr. Broom said the bill was " a compliance in every respect 
with the terms of the contract, and is only a compliance therewith." 

In the course of the debate, Mr. William Smith said, that the offi- 
cers " had asked bread and we gave them a stone." Mr, Wasb- 
burne, of Maine, considered that " a nation that is able to perform its 
" promises and obligations and does not do it, cannot stand, and 
" ought not to stand." The bill passed by yeas 106, nays 60. 
Among the yeas being Hon. Justin S. Morrill of Vermont, now of 
the United States Senate, and author of the adverse Senate report, 
No. 101 of the present session, referred to in this statement. 

On the 6th August, 1856, the bill which had just passed the House 
was taken up in the Senate, and explained by Mr. Evans. Mr. 
Toombs, of Georgia, somewhat furiously assailed it. He insisted 
that it was a gratuity and not a debt; that the report of the House 



24 

Committee was a fraudulent one; that it did not truly represent 
the facts, and that it concealed the facts on which the bill was 
founded. He said that Cons-ress was deceived in beins^ told that 
General Washington and the men of that day urged this law on 
Congress. " General Washington," he said, " did no such thing. 
" Tlie Senate preferred to go it blind rather than look into the sub- 
" ject. The bill was unquestionably a bounty. Hundreds of the 
" officers did not live the ten years for which they got half pay." 
" Sir," said Mr. Toombs, " the Government paid interest on the 
" certificates every day." [Mr. Toombs seems never to have read 
Washington's circular letter of June 8, 1783, in which he said, the 
half pay or commutation, " was more than a common debt ; it is a 
" debt of honor; it can never be considered a pension or gratuity, 
" nor cancelled until it is fairly discharged."] Mr. Clay of Alabama 
also opposed the bill, which was then postponed to the third Mon- 
day ot December. 

On the 22d August, 1856, Mr. Clay offered a resolution, which 
was amended and agreed to on the 30th, calling for a report from 
the Secretary of the Interior on the probable amount of money 
requisite under the bill which had passed the House. Such a report 
was accordingly made at the commencement of the session in 
December. It came from Commissioner Minot of the Pension 
Ofiice. An abstract of it forms part of this statement. 

The subject was again before the Senate on the 15th December, 
1856, when the repoT-t of Mr. Evans (of date February 21, 1856) 
was read, and Mr. Evans addressed the Senate. Mr. Seward fol- 
lowed, reading a letter from a revolutionary officer, Webb. Mr. 
Pratt, of Marj'land, wished to include officers of the Navy. This, 
Mr. Foster, of Connecticut, opposed, as also Mr. Evans. Mr, 
Comegys, of Delaware, defended the measure as a case of debt, call- 
ing for the legal compensation of the claimants. The officers of the 
Navy would stand on a diflerent footing. Mr. Crittenden, of Ken- 
tuck}', warmly advocated the measure as designed to discharge " an 
unsatisfied obligation." Mr. Butler, of South Carolina, could only 
favor the bill — and he did favor it — on the ground of "contract." 
Mr. Toombs being absent, Messrs. Brown, of Mississippi, and Fitz- 
patrick, of Alabama, wished to hear further from him. Mr. Seward 
replied. Mr, Foot, of Vermont, supported the measure. Mr. Pugh, 
of Ohio, opposed. Mr. Hale, of New Hampshire, sustained it. The 
amendment of Mr. Pratt to include officers of the Navy was then 
rejected, by yeas 10, nays 33. Mr, Bayard, of Delaware, looked 
upon the measure as a " bounty," and not a legal claim. Mr. Evans 
replied. 

On the 23d of December the subject was again up, Mr. Evans 
leading off. Mr, Toombs continued his remarks at great length, 
treating the facts of the case in his peculiar way. Mr. Iverson, of 
Georgia, put in a letter from Col. Allen McLane. Mr. Toombs 
" didn't believe " the statement. Plere an episode occurred iuvolv. 



25 

mg the character of Col. McLane, which was defended by Mr. 
Comegys and Mr, Cass. Mr. Stuart, of Michigan, looked upon the 
measure as proposing a gratuity. Mr. Mason, of Virginia, regarded 
it as not a legal claim. Mr. Crittenden spoke at length for the bill. 
He felt " a moral obligation " to pay this debt. The subject was up 
again on the 5th January, when Mr. Stuart suggested an obstacle 
to the passage of the measure in that the President (Mr. Pierce) 
would be a beneficiary under it. Mr. Seward exhibited an old cir- 
cular letter on the subject of the claims dated Pittsburg, March 8th, 
1S08. Mr. Seward spoke at great length, unfolding a magazine of 
documentary evidence in support of the measure. Mr. Pugh spoke 
in opposition. On tlie 14th January Mr. Clay, of Alabama, spoke 
again at much length, and expressed his belief that the bill would 
require seven and a half millions. Mr. Bell, of New Hampshire, re- 
sponded on behalf of the bill, believing its passage called for by the 
*' highest considerations of justice and right." The next day Mr. 
. Foster followed quite fully on the same side. A miscellaneous de- 
bate ensued. Mr. Seward quoted General Washington. The sub- 
ject was up again on the 16th January, when, by a vote of 24 to 23, 
it was postponed to the first Monday of December following. 

On the 21st January (page 393) Mr. Evans asked — inasmuch as 
the bill had gone over to the next Session — that his committee be 
discharged from the further consideration of a large number of pe- 
titions and memorials from heirs and legal representatives of deceased 
officers, whi(;h was before them, and also from memorials of the Cin- 
cinnati Society of Maryland, representing members of the old Ma- 
ryland Line; of the Cincinnati Societies of Virginia, Massachusetts, 
and Pennsylvania; and of certain resolutions in behalf of the 
claims from the Legislature ot the State of ISTew York. Leave was 
granted accordingly. 

Li the House of Representatives, January 23d, 1857, Mr. Broom, 
of Pennsylvania, gave notice of his intention to move for leave to 
introduce a bill, " to provide," &c., &c., similar to the previous bill. 
To this, Mr. Jones, of Tennessee, oDJected, and the subject was 
dropped for that Session and Congress. 



Early in the following Congress the Hon. Reuben E. Fenton, of 
New York, introduced a bill, No. 234, into the House of Represent- 
atives, which, in addition to the usual provisions for half-pay, de- 
duction of commutation, &t;., proposed an amount of land to Revo- 
lutionary Soldiers. The bill was favorably reported back from the 
committee, to which it had been referred, by Mr. Cragin, of New 
Hampshire, March 5th, 1858, without amendment, and placed upon 
the Calendar. On the 11th June, 1858, it was before the House, 
and Mr. Fenton addressed the House fully thereupon. (Appendix, 
Globe, page 499.) The Baird claim before the Court of Claims is. 
well explained in this speech. But the claioas of the Revolution, 
4 



26 

were not as interesting as those of the Kansas question, and practi- 
cally nothing was clone. Mr. Fenton, however, brought the subject 
before the House once more in the 36th Congress, in bill (No. 13), 
and reported (ISTo. 250) from the appropriate committee, on the 29th 
March, 1860. His able speech thereupon was delivered May 18th, 
1860, but the political excitements of the time overlaid the subject, 
which was not revived till a bill (No. 1184) was introduced once 
more. This was by Mr. Archer, of Maryland, on the 12th January, 
1S74. The Bill was twice read and reterred to the Committee on 
" War Claims," but not reported on therefrom, probably for the 
reason that action of the committee was arrested by the contents of 
a Report which had been requested from the Commissioner of Pen- 
sions (Baker), and which was only less extravagant than the pre- 
posterous '•statement" by Commissioner Gill appended to Report 
No. 101, of the 1st Session of the present Congress, by Hon. J. S. 
Morrill of the Senate. The bill. No. 137, before the Senate, on 
which this report of Mr. Morrill's was made, was presented on the 
20th of December 1875, by Hon. Senator Dennis, of Maryland. The 
subject of it had no real consideration by the Committee on Revo- 
lutionary Claims, to which it was referred, because Mr. Morrill, 
immediately after making his report in committee, procured tVom 
the Senate an "indefinite postponement" of the bill, tbus cutting 
off any worthy investigation, and allowing no opportunity for shew- 
ing to the committee, or himself, the utter lack of value in the data 
on which he had relied. And thus we are brought upon the present 
House bill, No. 3694, awaiting the action of Congress. 

Of the Invalid and Foreign Officers of the Revolutionary 

Army. 

The provisions made by Congress for discharging the obligations 
of the country to the invalid and foreign officers of the Revolution, 
place its equal duty to the other officers in a clear and unquestion- 
able light. What Congress did for the invalid and foreign officers 
it did under virtue of the act of October 21, 1780, and the act of 22d 
March, 1783, applicable to all the "returned" officers alike. Con- 
gress went to the relief of the invalids, in who^e hands the certifi- 
cates had proved of so little worth, because not to relieve was to 
abandon those champions of their country to the poorhouse, the 
prison, or the grave. The " losses " sustained by the invalids 
are acknowledged by Hon. Mr. Morrill's report (at page 6), and 
they were no other than the " losses " sustained on the certificates. 

The method of relief adopted by Congress was a withdrawal of 
the certificates, or other paper bonds of equal value, from the hands 
of the invalids, and a placing of those officers under the operation 
of the pension laws, whereby they would receive realities instead of 
fictions. Some hardship was imposed by this arrangement, not- 
withstanding, because it could have been no easy task in the case 



27 

of many a destitute invalid to hunt up and purchase the security 
equiviilent to the certificate he had heen compelled to sell. But for 
the probable low price of " securities" generally at the perio<l in 
qnestion, the substitution demanded by the act of September 14, 
1786, might have proved beyond many an invalid's ability. 

Justice, however, was substantially done in a great many cases; 
yet it was effected by nothing less than an extinguishment of " com- 
mutation," so far forth as the invalids had^been aff"ected by it. 

If common humanity stepped forward to the relief of the invalids, 
the desire to stand fair and lionorable in the eyes of Europe was the 
motive which prompted Congress to pay the six per cent, interest 
on the certificates held by the foreign officers who had returned 
home. " The interest on the debts due to foreign officers," says 
Congress, 15tli February, 1786, " must be provided for and annu- 
" ally paid." Several appropriations were made for the payment 
of this interest between the first issuing of the certificates to their 
foreigu holders and the time (January, 1793) when this whole debt, 
interest and principal, was wholly and forever discharged. It may, 
however, be mentioned, as matter of history, that the payment of 
the interest (about $11,186 per annum) to the officers in Europe was 
80 ir^'egular as to cause great dissatisfaction and compUiiut among 
them, a fact of which Mr. Jefferson advised Congress through a let- 
ter to John Jay, of date August 6, 1787, and to Mr. Madison of 
date four days previously, and May 3, 1788. Likewise to Washing- 
ton, May 2, 1788. (See also Journal of Congress for August 20, 
1788.) 

This interest on the commutation certificates paid out to the 
foreign officers was, nevertheless, even if spasmodically, paid ; and 
paid in gold and silver. Whilst no one ever did or ever>vill re- 
proach Congress — if a degree of difference there must be between 
the circumstances of payment to the foreign and the native officers — 
for showing a courteous preference to the former; still, when the 
difference becomes so very great that whilst the certificates of the 
foreign officers are kept always up to par by the payment of the 
interest falling due on them in gold and silver, the certificates of 
the native officers are let run down almost to nothing, because all 
interest on them is refused, no justification can be admitted. The 
certificate in the hand of the foreign officer is fully paid, principal 
and interest, in the best of money. The certificate in the hand of 
the native officer is repudiated by the supreme authority, and left 
to become a mere matter of highway pillage and prey for the spec- 
ulators and sharpers of this and other lands. The contrast is too 
broad ; the inequality too gross ; no good reason for it can be shown, 
and the consequences of it have been bitter and afflictive. Mr. 
El bridge Gerry, of Massachusetts, was clearly right when he thought 
(February 10, 1790, page 1178) that " no discrimination ought to 
" be made between the domestic and foreign creditor. * * He con- 
" ceived that such a measure (as this discrimination) can never be 



28 

'' a,2:reeable to the United States, because it is inconsistent with 
''justice and common honesty." 

But there was in the matter much that was foolish as well as 
wrong. Honor and honesty would have been the best policy here 
as elsewhere. Had Congress completed its own measure, begun, 
but by no means finished on the 22d March, 17^3, by publicly pro- 
viding for the lawful interest on the certificates held by the native 
officers, as it somewhat clandestinely did for those held by the 
foreign, the Government itself would have been greatly the gainer. 
It would be hard to sa}' how much. The time of Congress in pro- • 
tracted debates for almost three generations would have been no 
small item to save. Congress would have been relieved of atten- 
tion to the ever-recurring memorials, reports, and enquiries that 
have been presented and made in consequence. When funding 
came, all would have gone smooth and easy, for every interest 
would have been satisfied. The pension acts from 1786 down to 
1828, if they, or most of them, had ever existed at all, would have 
had far less of the scope and costliness that have attended them. 
And, lastly, there would not be at this day, a solemn call upon the 
country to cleanse the records of its opening history, nay, the very 
first course of the national edifice, in a moral regard, of a stain 
and dishonor designated by Mr. Madison as " enormous and fla- 
grant," and making expungement " a great national object." 

Was Congress aware of the injurious consequences that must 

ensue to the native officers from non-provision for the 

interest on their certificates as it fell due ? 

That this must be answered in the affirmative the proof is clear 
and decisive. Almost as soon as Congress was sure that peace had 
come, they recommended the establishment of a federal import 
duty, or tax, in order to discharge the public obligations, and place 
the public credit on a healthy basis. They addressed the States on 
the 24th April, 1783, proposing an " efi'ectual provision " of funds 
for "paying the annual interest" on the public debt, which was the 
utmost the country could then undertake. Congress declared that 
" funds which will certainly and punctually produce this annual sum 
must be provided.''' And v*'ith additional emphasis they insisted that 
" as the principal of the debts due the public creditors could not 
" be paid to them on demand, /A^ interest should be so efiectually 
" and satisfactorily secured as to enable them, if they incline, to 
" transfer their stock at its full value,'' 

With this loyal intent. Congress included in their estimates 
(Journ. Congr. April 29th, 1783), accompanying the address, the 
" commutation to the army," of |5, 000, 000 as part of the " domestic 
debt;" and in the estimate of what was requisite to meet the 
" annual interest " thereupon, they included the interest ($300,000) 
on the commutation. 



29 

As part of the same address Congress reproduced a communica- 
tion they had made some time before in answer to one from the 
Governor of Rhode Ishmd, in which they affirm that an "omission " 
to provide "for paying the interest annually^- on the public debt, 
for wiiich " the faith of the United States is pledged," would work 
" the. deepest mgratitude and cruelty " to the public creditor, and " sicarip 
the national character with indelible disgrace." 

They then went on to shew how beneficial it would be to the public 
creditor to make a [)ermanent provision for the payment of his in- 
terest, and to " render the evidence of that debt negotiable.''' See also 
the resolution of Congress of June 19, 1783. 

Again, in the resolution submitted on the 27th April, 1784, a 
recognition is made of the " well known fact that whenever the 
"2^«y/we?(^ of interest on a principal sum be well secured, such is the 
" nature of monied operations, that the proprietors of the evidences 
" of such a principal sura can always transfer them for their full value." 

It is not necessarj'- to quote further. Congress perfectly well un- 
derstood the benelit that would enure to the officers from a provis- 
ion for the payment of the animal interest on their certificates, and 
in the spring of 1783, faithfully and honorably intended to make it 
for them. 13ut between that date and the April of the following 
year, a new and subtle design had sprang up, and new men were 
put into Congress to carry it out. That design was to prevent and 
defeat the practical execution of the commutation act, and to scatter 
the just expectations of the officers under it to the winds. The vote 
of the 22d April, 1784, eftected this; the oft-plighted fixith of the 
United States was broken; the "deepest ingratitude and cruelty" 
were inflicted on the most meritorious class of the public creditors; 
the national character was defaced at its opening, and consequences 
ensued to the officers most bitter, humiliating, and ruinous. 

On the Funding Act of August 4, 1790 

It is manifest that the rights of the officers under the contracts 
made with them in the acts of Congress of October 21, 1780, and 
March 22, 1783, are in no manner compromised or affected by the 
long-subsequent funding act of August 4, 1790. Not only was that 
act yet unconceived of when the officers were disbanded and dis- 
missed, but tiie bare idea or principle of such an act — grounded aa 
it was upon customs' imposts and other taxes to be laid and col- 
lected under Federal authoritj- — was about as distasteful as the 
" half pay " itself in sevei-al States of the Confederation. The offi- 
cers disbanded in 1788 wei-e not inspired with prescience to know, 
and neither Congress nor the country ever informed them that the 
Confederation would be superseded within the next ten years, and 
a Union under a new Constitution set up. Had that been fore- 
known and a future funding act assured, they might have been able 
to dispose of their certificates at a very considerable advance upon 



30 

the prices they actually obtained. But these things were not known ; 
everything in public affairs looked dark and cheerless ; the States 
were obdurite; Congress was uns_yni[>athizing ; even Washington 
was alarmed, and the necessities of the otiicers and their families 
were unrelenting. 

To mnke the otRcers in any way responsible for not having kept, 
or too cheaply sold, their certificates, would be to punish them for 
not being prophets of what should happen when some scores or 
hundreds of them were in their graves. It must therefore be con- 
cluded that the lights of the officers sutfered no diminution by 
reason of the funding act of 1790, and those riglits and claims must 
be decided upon precisely as if the said funding act had never ex- 
isted — a circumstance, in fact, provided for by the 9th section of 
the act itself. 

In alluding to the subject of funding. Senate report No. 101) 
shows little self-consistency. On page 1, it is intimated that the 
officers first proposed " commutation " in order to secure " a round 
" sum a^ once to start life with as their capital in a new country 
" rather than a tithe of the sum year by year'^ And on page 6 it 
admits that " part" (how much less than the whole ?) of the officers 
" suffered loss when they came to dispose of their certificates," 
except the fortunate few who were able to " keep them until they 
" were redeemed, principal and interest, by the United States." As 
matter of fact, funding did not practically take place till 1791,-2 
or 3, and "redemption by the United States" many years 3'et after. 
How, then, according to the report itself, could or did funding first, 
and then redemption long after, furnish the valuable object of " a 
round sum to stai't life with'" at the time of disbandment? 

If the officers wanted and stipulated for " a round sum " at the 
close of the Revolution, the report admits they did not get it by the 
commutation, because they had to wait (and, as Mr. Toombs re- 
marked, hundreds of them to die,) until commutation had become 
funding; and if the great majority of them needed something im- 
mediate and instant, and got nothing better than depreciated certi- 
ficates, then the case for tlie claimants is sufficiently made out from 
Mr. Morrill's report itself, and the whole responsibility lodged upon 
the party by whose fault the certificates had so sunk in value. 

The probity and honor of Congress and the country stood inex- 
tricably involved in the duty of sustaining the market value of the 
certificates they had paid out, to the best of their eflbrts and ability. 
That duty, most unhappily, they did not discharge, but did that 
wrong which this report will no further designate than to say that 
it was the wrong of putting bonds into tlie hands of the officers, 
and when there, of utterly dishonoring and abandoning them. Had 
the officers failed to sustain Congress and the countrj^ against its 
foreign foes as Congress failed to sustain the officers against their 
bitter domestic adversaries, freedom and independence would have 
sunk, and the Republic been extinguished. 



31 

On confounding subjects which are different. 

Only poverty of information, or lack of sjood argumentg, conld 
urge the device of co))foiinding things so different as the deprecia- 
tion on the comnmtation-certiticates, and the depreciation of the 
Continental cnrrency. Yet Senate Eeport, JSTo. 101, (at page 6) 
does this, copying, as b}^ a pretty uniform practice, the hasty utter- 
ances of ill-informed debaters. The Continental cnrrency was in 
every hand, public and private, civil and militarj'. Irs fluctuations 
and falls affected all who held it, until at last it perished ; — worthless 
and universally — b,y common consent never to revive. The certifi- 
cates were the contrary of all this. Though it was maliciously de- 
signed that they should become as utterly valueless as the currency 
itself, tliey were saved that extreme dishonor; for as the services 
and sufferings of their first holders had preserved the life of the 
Republic, so did their certificates found its future prospei-ity. The 
Continental currency was issued for present use during the War, 
and died with it. The certificates were not intended to have virtue 
till after the War was over, and, in fact, wholly unlike the currency, 
they were finally redeemed ; though not for the benefit of the par- 
ties who, for so many sacred reasons, ought to have enjoyed it. 

We may be sure that none of the Continental currency held by 
the invalid officers in 1786 was returned to Congress to be exchanged 
for something better; it was too worthless for that ; yet we know 
that the certificates, or " securities " equivalent, which they held, 
were recalled, and pensions granted m their place. So with the 
foreign officers. Their certificates not only never failed, but never 
depreciated, and were paid off" within ten years after issue, in gold 
and silver, to the last cent. The attempt, therefore, to confound 
the two subjects as merely varieties among the general debris of the 
Revolution, might be forgiven to General Cass in his remarks on 
the 18th April, 1854, because he acknowledged to only an imperfect 
acquaintance with the topic. But to others, whose time for research 
was ample; whose opportunities are the widest, and pretensions to 
a " more judicial spirit" intended to be imposing, there does not 
appear to be so good an excuse. 

Besides all which is the inconsistency in Senate Report 101 of 
frequently denominating the said "certificates" as "securities" 
which, on page 6, it intimates to have been no better than the gen- 
eral rubbish remaining after the great struggle. 

As to the parallel attempted to be run between the " certificates " 
of the Revolutionary oflicers and the " paper currency " paid the 
national troops in our recent war, it is no parallel at all. But a 
parallel might more fairly be run between the Continental currency 
and the paper mone}^ of the late war ; also between the Revolu- 
tionary " certificates " and our present " bonds." The Senate Re- 
port, however, puts these respective matters not parallel but cross- 
wise. 



32 

Finally, and in a word, the cause of the depreciation of the Con- 
tinental currency was inability. On the other hand, the deprecia- 
tion of the certificates was unnecessary-, and a crime. 

On Claims for Revolutionary Soldiers, &C. 

The history of the prosecution of the officers' claims under the 
contracts of 1780 and '83, presents the interpolation — sincere or 
insincere — of frequent embarrassments throuo;h the setting up of 
supernumerary claims in behalf of soldiers and others who partici- 
pated in the War of the jRevolution. This species of repeated ob- 
stacle to justice for the officers seems to have been very distinctly 
apprehended by General Washington, and the matter was deemed 
b}' him of sufficient importance to require a separate paragraph in 
his ever-memorable circular letter of June 8th, 1783, written subse- 
quently to the passage of the commutation measure. " With re- 
" gard," says Washington, for it is as true to-day as at- the hour he 
wrote it, '' to a distinction between officers and soldiers, it is 
"sufficient that the uniform experience of everjMiation in the world, 
"combined with our own, proves tlie utility and propriety of the 
"discrimination. Rewards, in proportion to the aids which thepub- 
" lie derives from them, are unquestionably due to all its servants. 
" In some lines the soldiers have, perhaps, generally had as ample 
"compensation for their services by the large bounties which have 
" been paid to them as their officers will receive in the proposed 
"commutation; in others if, besides the donation of lands, the pay- 
" ment of arrearages of clothing and wages (in which articles all the 
" component parts of the army must be put upon the same footing) 
" we take into tlie estimate the bounties many of the soldiers have 
"received, and the gratuity of one years' full pay, which is prom- 
" ised to all, possibly their situation (every circumstance being duly 
" considered) will not be deemed less eligible than man}- of the offi- 
" cers. Should a further reward, however, be judged equitable, I 
" will venture to assert no one will enjoy greater satisfaction than 
" myself, on seeing an exemption from taxes for a limited time 
" (which has been petitioned for in some instances) or an}^ other 
" adequate immunity or compensation, granted to the brave defen- 
" ders of their country's cause ; but neither the adoption nor rejec- 
" tion of this proposition will in any manner affect, much less mili- 
" tate against^ the act of Congress by which ihey have offered five years' 
"full pay, in lieu of the half pay for life, which had before been 
"promised to the officers of the army." 

N"otwithstanding the cordial willingness with which Washington 
would have consented to the extension of grace and bounty to the 
soldiers, &c,, that it might have pleased Congress to grant, it is quite 
certain that he did not regard the soldiers as entitled to it on the 
ground of contract or debt, as was the case with the officers. A fiiir 
proof of this may be seen in his manner of writing on the subject of 



S3 

a vagary on the part of some of the Connecticut lines. In a letter 
to the President of Congress, dated April 18th, 1783, in reference 
to a petition from non-commissioned officers of the Connecticut line 
asking for half pay or commutation, Wasliington said: "Plow far 
" their ideas, if not suppressed by some lucky expedient, may pro- 
*' ceed, it is beyond my power to divine." 

As for the private soldiers of the Revolution they appear to have 
been not only justly but liberally dealt with; therein remarkably 
contrasting with the case of the officers. If the Pension Otfice Re- 
ports may be relied upon, several scores of millions of dollars have 
been paid as pensions to the soldiers of the Revolution, and their 
widows and children. It may be strange, but it is true, that whilst 
the generosity of the country has been forward and profuse; its 
justice has been laggard and grudging. 

Certain Errors in the Appendix to Senate Report No. 101, 
44th Congress, 1st Session. 

One of the most conspicuous of these errors is the introduction 
into the Statement on page 13 — upon which the grand monetary 
conclusions of the report are founded — of a numerous array of staff 
and other officers, such as adjutants, quartermasters, paymasters, 
mnstermasters, judge-advocate, commissary, clothiers, &o., who have 
neither part nor lot either in Senate bill, 137, or the present House 
bill, No. 3694. This error is the more surprising from the tact that 
the reference in the 1st section of these bills is to acts of Congress, 
specifically confined to officers of the line; a fact of which the Re- 
port itself gives information on pages 4 and 10, wherein the pream- 
ble to the act of March 22d, 1783,"and the citation from the act of 
May 15th, 1828, both declare the officers in question to be those of 
the Continental liws. It also appears strange, even if this prelimi- 
nary fact had escaped the author of the report, that the head of the 
Pension Bureau should stray so widely in the very alphabet and out- 
set of bis duty. 

But there is another error on the same page yet graver and of 
larger effect. This is the inclusion of " foreign officers " in the ac- 
count, with a charge for them of no less a sum than $3,299,753y^^^o-. 
It seems scarcely credible that parties furnished with every official 
requisite, and wearing the prestige of accuracy, should not know 
that all the foreign officers of the Revolutionary army were finally 
and forever settled with and paid off more than eighty years ago ! 
The act of May 8th, 1792, in the Statutes at Large, provides for this 
in its 5th section, and the actual amount paid tliereunder is found 
reported by Alexander Hamilton (Annals of Congress, for 1791-'93, 
at page 1182), to have been $l91,316.y9oV Then the 4th section of 
the act of May 15th, 1828, cited by Hon. Mr. Morrill, at page 10 of 
his report, positively excludes every foreign officer from its benefits, 
for the obvious reason, it is to be presumed,. that to the foreign offi-- 
cers nothing liad been left due. 
5 



u 

The estimate of the Commissioner of Pensions as to the propor- 
'tion necessary to be paid to his " foreign officers " may be regarded 
as furnishing a fair test of the degree of reliance that is to be phiced 
on his estimates in generah He puts the " foreign officers" down 
at an additional one-sixth, which would give for their numbers just 
384. Now in point of fact they numbered 56. 

Again, he puts down the amount that would he due to them at 
$3,299,753 -^-^\, whereas, as we have seen, at their final payment in 
1792-3, including the principal and interest of their certiticates, 
with possible arrearages also included, they really received 
$191,316j^/^, which is only about one-seventeenth of tlie Commis- 
sioner's estimate. 

If the foregoing furnishes examples of wide error in a matter 
about which the Pension Office consumed nearly two weeks, the 
letter of the commissioner in answer to Mr. Morrill's request dis- 
plays a degree of inattention (not to suggest, design) scarcely con- 
ceivable in a formal executive document purporting to inform and 
influence the legislative branch. In undertaking to tell how much 
was paid certain Virginia officers under the act of July 5, 1832, he 
puts down the amount at $ 1,904, 330 ^^o^^, and makes it the basis of 
an important computation vitally affecting the bill. He gives no 
information as to the source whence this particular amount is de- 
rived, but it will, nevertheless, be found, in the Pension Office Re- 
port for 1872 at page 347, or the same report for 1873 at page 337. 
It is, however, like all the other errors of the commissioner, heav- 
ily in excess of the truth, viz : $688,217. This came from copying 
out the extension not of the line pertaining to the said Virginia offi- 
cers (which is $1,216,113y5^^jj), but of an adjoining line relating to a 
diflerent subject. 

Before leaving this particular point it should be noted that the 
commissioner's error in miscopying figures is much surpassed by 
the mistake of alluding for any purpose at all, to those Virginia 
officers provided for in the act of July 5, 1832. Those officers were 
not, as he supposes, officers of the Virginia "Continental line" 
proper, and, accordingly, not one of them was " returned" as such 
at the end of the war ; for had they been of that class, and obtained 
relief under the act of July 5, 1832, every " Continental line" offi- 
cer from every other State would have immediately, and irresisti- 
bly, demanded from Congress to be put upon the same advantageous 
footing, and Congress could not have refused ! The commissioner 
certainly made an unintentional mistake in this particular, having 
unwittingly furnished claimants in every State, other than Virginia, 
with an argument that could not be gainsayed. Unfortunately for 
the claimants, he is very wrong in this, for the Virginia officers 
provided for m the first section of said act were officers of the Vir- 
ginia " State " line sent to the seat of war in and near Pennsyl- 
vania to fill up the gaps made in several Virginia Continental regi- 
ments at the battles of Brandywine and Germautown, but they did 



35 

not continue in Continental service beyond two or, at most, three 
years. (See House Report on William Vawter's case, January 26, 
1835; on case of Col. Geo. Gibson, December 22, 1837; also House 
Report No. 191, 1st session, 22d Congress.) 

Another point of importance presents itself in an exaggeration 
in the commissioner's report of the number to be taken as the aver- 
age " expectation of life " at the close of the war (taken at only 
ten years by the Congress of 1783) to be used as a co-factor with 
the annual rate. Arbitrarily assuming 29 years for the average age 
of the officers at the close of the war in 1783, he finds in the Car- 
lisle " tables of mortality " the number 35 set over against it as the 
corresponding " expectation of life." But neither of these num- 
bers is admissible. It is plain that the average age of the officers 
ot all grades at the end of the war must have been more than 29, 
which is considerably more likely to have been the age of the 
youngest. Neither can it be correct to put the " expectation of 
life " in men who, to cite their memorial to Congress, were " bro- 
ken in health and fortune," so high as in the case of civilians living 
in circumstances of peace, plenty and comfort, as contemplated in 
the Carlisle " tables." But, fortunately, we are not abandoned 
wholly to conjecture in this particular. By actual count of the 
surviving officers under the act of May 15, 1828, (see Doc. No. 68, 
2d session, 20th Congress) there were 370 such, which is as near as 
may be, to one-sixth of ttie number " returned" at the end of the 
war, leaving the other five-sixths to have died in the 45 years that 
had preceded. Hence one-sixth died every nine years, or one-half 
in twenty-seven years; whence it follows that 27 is the required 
number, and 1810 the average year, and not 1818, as would follow 
from the assumption of the commissioner ; which would, of course, 
necessitate the resulting great inaccuracy that more than 700 offi- 
cers died in the ten years' interval between 1818 and 1828 ! 

Once more. In the Commissioner's reference to the deductions 
to be made under the provisions of section 3 of the bill, is dis- 
played the same inattention to accuracy elsewhere prevailing. He 
shuns any specification of these deductions on account of " com- 
mutation " and pensions under the act of May 15, 1828 ; he makes 
no allowance for them in seeking the requisite amount to be appro- 
priated, but keeps them out of sight and proceeds to divide out his 
undiminished " total " in search of an excessive " average amount 
to each " officer. Nothing could be more incorrect, and yet — what 
is most astonishing — it is all accepted by the honorable author and 
incorporated into his report. 

Although the Commissioner may have attempted to conceal this 
inaccuracy under the singular plea that his " office has no means of 
estimating" the amounts to be deducted as above, there is no real 
difficulty in obtaining a fair estimate. The largest item in such an 
estimate is furnished' by Mr. Morrill's report itself at page 2, where 
the original commutation is correctly set down (copied from Minot's 



36 

report) at $5,086,250. If to this be added the snm of the amounts 
paid the officers under the so-called Pension Act of May 15, 1828, 
which must be much nearer two millions than one, (the Commis- 
sioner ought to have been able to tell the exact cent) the total will 
be little, if any less than seven million of dollars, which, in the 
commonest fairness and propriety, ought to have been deducted, 
not from the Commissioner's grand " total " which includes pay- 
ment to " foreign officers," but from the first amount above it, all 
swollen and wildly incorrect as it has been shown to be. And this 
would of itself cut down the " sum estimated" on page 9 of the 
report to one-half of what there appears, leavii:g, tor the present, 
nicer and more exact computations out of the question. 

There is yet, finally, one more omission in the report, requiring 
to be noticed. The bill provides for the deduction, in every case, 
of the original commutation of five years' full pay from the ascer- 
tained half pay to the ofiicer's death. Now five years' full pay is 
equal to ten years' half pay, and therefore in the case of every offi- 
cer who died within ten years from the date of commutation, the 
commutation charged against him will absorb the half pay due him, 
and leave liim no balance. We have seen that the officers died at 
the average of one-sixth of their number in nine years, or say 41 
per annum; the deaths in the ten years from 1783 to 1793 would 
therefore be about 410, all of which are to be deducted from any 
estimated number of officers whose representatives would claim 
under the bill. The consideration which leads to this result is very 
simple and obvious, yet it finds no place in Senate Report No. 101, 
though an example was set for it to all the parties to that report by 
the preceding report of Commissioner Minot which was in their 
hands. 



Of the rates of depreciation at which the Commutation Cer- 
tificates were sold. 

Some question is made in Senate Report, No. 101, (at page 6), of 
the rapid and great depreciation in value of the commutation certifi- 
cates issued to the otficers, and the "authority" for such alleged 
depreciation is said to be " unknown." Almost as well might we 
question the fact of the American Revolution itself. The debates 
in Congress in 1790 teem with testimonies on this head. Mr, Bou- 
dinot, probably from cases within his own knowledge, rated the 
sale of certificates at Is. 6d. in the pound, or 3-40 of the face 
value. Mr. Madison placed the rate at one-seventh ; others at one- 
tenth ; many at one-eighth, and this last was adopted by Mr. John- 
son's committee in their report of December 7th, 1818, and by the 
committee consisting of Senatoi's Walker, James, Sumner, Foot, 
and Chase in the Mooer's case, 5th April, 1852. (Report 164, 32d 
Congress, 1st Session.) 



37 

The letter of Mr. Jefferson to Messrs. Van Staphorst of Amster- 
dam, Hollanfl, will give information on this subject. These parties 
have been said to liave profited very heavily by the purchase of cer- 
tificates. See Mr. Jefferson's letters to these parties of July 30th, 
1785 and October 25th, 1785. 

Abstract of Commissioner (of Pensions) Minot's Report in 

answer to a call of the Senate of August 30th, 1856, 

being Ex. Doc. No. 2, 34th Cong., 3d Session. 

This Report was evidently prepared with considerateness and im- 
partiality, which cannot be said for all reports on the subject that 
have issued from the same office. 

It puts, according to the best information in the Pension Office, 
the " returned " officers at 2,163 in number. From this luimber, 
for reasons stated, he takes one-third ; leaving 1,442 cases of claim. 
He places the average lite of the officers after 1783, at 25 years. 

The actual payments by certificate, in 1783-'4, of five years' full 
pay, were $5,086,250. This, at half pay rate, would be $508,625 per 
annum. But if only two-thirds of the original cases should appear 
as claimants, then only $339,084 per annum, would be required. 

Since the five years' full pay, or ten years' half pay (i. e. the com- 
mutation) is to be deducted, then the above 25 years average after 
1783 must be diminished by ten, making 15 for one factor and 
$339,084 for the other, and consequently $5,086,250 for a total. This 
must be augmented by the amount for the probable number of 35 
surgeons' mates, equal to $228,000, making a final total of $5,314,- 
250 as the probable amount necessary under the bill of 1856. 

Commissioner Minot, however, presents an estimate derived from 
certain approved data placed in his hands, wliich will reduce the 
first total to $4,842,669, and consequently the probable amount to 
$5,070,669 under the bill of 1856. 

He states " that there will be comparatively little difficulty in the 
" establishment of claims by the parties properly entitled under the 
*' bill. The records of the Treasury show all the parties who re- 
*' ceived commutation under the resolution of March, 1783, and 
" whose claims, therefore, are embraced by this bill. The points of 
" proof necessary to establish claims by the representatives under 
"the bill will therefore be the death ot the officer, and their rela- 
" tionship to him; which, in ordinary cases, it is presumed can 
" readily be proven." 

N. B. It may assist in accounting for Minot's deduction of one-third 
from the original number of " returned" officers, to remark that the 
largest part of this deduction will consist of the number of officers 
who died before 1793. They may be averaged at abo'it 410. As their 
commutation, to be allowed under the bill, would exceed their half 



38 

pay, their claims are considered cancelled. This may seem to be, and 
no doubt is a hardship on the equital)le rights of those officers; but 
it seems inseparable from the principle of the measure now before 
Congress, which is to restore the contract between the officers and 
the Government to its original basis, and then to give the Govern- 
ment credit in full for whatever it may have paid, or, rather, prom- 
ised to pay as commutation in 1783, or " pension," as sometimes 
improperly called, under the act of May 15th, 1828. Besides the 
foregoing, there will be a deduction for as man}- invalid officers as 
returned their certificates under the act of September 14th, 1786. 

It ought also to be noted that Minot's Report was made upon the 
bill which passed the House of Representatives July 30th, 1856. It 
contained no provision for any deduction under the act of May 15th, 
1828. But by the present bill, 3694, deduction is to be made of 
nearly one half of what was paid to, say, 370 officers from March 
3d, 1826, to the end of their lives, under said act. 

Recapitulation. 

The protractedness of the foregoing statement has not been re- 
quired by anytliing in the subject itself, bat by the diversified mis- 
takes that have been made in regard to it. These needed to be 
corrected and removed, and an outline given of the proceedings in 
Congress about the matter. Stripped of exterior embarrassments, 
all is simple and readily understood. 

To save the Revolutionary cause it was indispensable that Con- 
gress should covenant or contract with as many officers of the line 
of the army as would tight the war out to its close, whenever that 
might happen. The officers accepted the terms proffered, the con- 
dition of the army rapidly improved, the war was fought through, 
the victory won, and the coveted prize of freedom and independ- 
ence securely gained. 

The officersliaving performed their part of the contract to the let- 
ter, it now became the other side to perform theirs. But here a hitch 
occurred. The other side, or a part of it — now that the prize was 
won — demurred to the terms of the contract, and vigorously clam- 
ored for modification. Placable in peace as they had been resolute 
in war, some of the officers signified their willingness to stipulate 
afresh, and appointed a committee of three to arrange new terms 
with Congress. The committee went upon their mission, were 
heard, and the event was that Congress granted on paper what it 
called an "equivalent" for the reward first promised. But the 
grant proved, in fact, little or no more than words, except to the 
foreign officers. The new terms were, if possible, worse broken 
than the old. Hundreds of native officers died without having re- 
ceived (and then indirectly) more than a tithe of their sacred due, 
or seen any reasonable substitute for payment ; whilst the great 
majority went down to the grave still and yet the most meritorious 
creditors of their country. 



39 

And now, will the United States, in this second century of their 
history, consent to live on under such a burden as the foregoing 
truly discloses? Will they still seek shelter behind the alleged 
poverty of the earliest and the sordid disinclination of a more recent 
day? or will they wipe off the otherwise inevitable stigma by a just, 
prompt, and complete discharge of the most sacred earthly duty 
now upon their hands? 

Though the preceding needs no external support, yet many con- 
siderations concur to sustain it. There is a long succession of spe- 
cial claims for commutation of officers not " returned," yet who 
have been paid, and some even with interest, in the best of money ; 
3'et the mass of " returned " officers about whose services there is 
no doubt were never paid, having received, perhaps, only a tenth 
or an eighth by the indirect means of the speculator. 

How just these claims are may well be judged from the proposi- 
tion, during the early months of 1783, to pay them off by a Euro- 
pean loan. The case was well understood b}- the men of that day. 
For the particulars of this scheme see the invaluable Madison Pa- 
pers, at date January 13, and February 19, 1783. The Madison 
Papers contain the only known reports of the debates and discus- 
sions in Congress and among the public men of that interesting 
period. 

The claims of the foreign officers, fully paid in the best of money, 
principal and interest, testify irresistibly for the equal rights of the 
native officer. Courtesy to the former in respect to priority of pay- 
ment can never justify the wrongful delay dealt out to the latter. 

Besides the influence and prestige due to the passage of the act 
of May 15, 1828, and bills in both Houses of Congress in 1855 and 
'56, there is the testimony of the Court of Claims in the case of 
Surgeon Absalom Baird, whose claim for commutation passed Con- 
gress in the act of June 23, 1836. The heir having then claimed 
interest on the deferred payment, the case was referred to the Court 
of Claims, was fullj' discussed there, and judgment rendered in his 
favor. Congress endorsed the Court's decision by its act of Aug. 
18, 1856. (See Opinion of Chief Justice Gilchrist in the case.) 

The opponents of this measure of justice and good faith have sel- 
dom rested their case upon actual facts and authentic testimony. 
Either a tissue of mere assumptions, erroneous history, or a super- 
serviceable zeal for uncovenanted gratuities to soldiers, militia, &c., 
has formed the basis of almost every effort at opposition. 

But, finally, it is due to truth and candor to record the fairness 
as well as to confess the force of several acknowledgments made in 
Senate Report a^o. 101. 

That report candidly acknowledges that nothing is lost to the 
validity of these claims, if intrinsically just, by reason of their anti- 
quity. The present Constitution suflicieutly secures them. 



40 

That these claims, if just, are "the most meritorious of all claims 
for nearly a century." 

That if jnst, as " matter of debt or of contract, it would be shame- 
ful to evade them by a plea of outlawry," or act of limitation. 

That no matter what the amount of money their payment would 
involve, they ought not, if" actually due upon principles of justice, 
to be rejected on account of their great magnitude" — a magnitude, 
it may be observed, as that of a hillock to a mountain compared 
with what would be requisite upon the undeniably gratuitous Boun- 
ties' bill which has been complimented with majorities in both 
branches in the present and previous Congress. 

And now, it only remains respectfully to recommend House Bill 
No. 3694 to the favorable action of Congress, believing it to be, as 
herein demonstrated, a just, righteous, and meritorious measure, 
the passage of which, both on public and private grounds, should 
be deferred no longer. 



-I 



1 

J 



The !)ottorn facts on which said claims are based, are — 

1st. A contract made by Congress (October 21st, i*?^j, guaranteeing half pay for 
life to all those Revolutionary Officers who should serve to the end of the war. 

"id. This contract for half-pay, after its fulfilment by the ofificers, was, in order to 
please a dissatisfied portion of the populations of certain states, commuted by Con- 
gress on the 22d of March, 1783, to five years' full pay, in money down, or securities at 
() per cent, annual interest (so as to be negotiable at or near par). 

od. But this commuted contract was no more respected (except to the foreign offi- 
cers) than its predecessor, because Congress did not pay in money down, and the 
" securities " palmed off upon the officers, were not only not what were expected, buf, 
besides, were speedily dishonored ("except as aforesaid) by the direct refusal of Con- 
gress to make provision for their annual interest ; and became, in consequence, in 
the hands of the native officers, ruinously depreciated and nearly worthless. 

4th. Owing to these successive instances of bad faith, those officers were benefitted 
by their contract to only a very small fraction of what it ought to have produced ; or, 
to use the language of distinguished cotemporary authorities, they were defrauded, 
or •' cheated." 

•')lh. The present House Bill, No. 3(J94, is, therefore, designed to purge the nation 
of the deep dishonor which has been acknowledged to attach on account of these facts,, 
by making such reparation to said officers through their estates, heirs, or descendants, 
as remains possible at the present time. Money due, and unjustly withholden, can 
work no blessing to the coffers that retain it. 

fitli. House Bill, No. 3694, has in it no quality whatever of bounty or gratuity. It 
is for the discharge of the most binding and sacred debt ever incurred by the Ameri- 
can people ; a debt which purchased their earthly salvation and happiness ; — in proof 
of which are the foregoing undeniable facts, and the uniform and united testimony of 
all. from the Revolution down to the present hour, who really understand the subject. 



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